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It is quite apparent that our current health care system is broken.

How many mothers have had to sit a watch their children die because they were denied the treatment that could have saved their lives.

Time and time again you hear stories about the “so called” Dr.’s that work for these insurance companies being given bonuses for denying claims.

My own sister had cancer. She was a hospice patient mainly because she could not afford the incredible amount of medications that she needed. She was told, by a hospice nurse, that if she pursued aggressive treatment that she could no longer receive hospice care. Now, please don’t get me wrong. I thank God for hospice. They are an absolute God sent. The problem was that her insurance did not cover many of the medications she needed. Her medical bills were mounting up and, being on a fixed income, there was no way she could have paid them all. So, as I watched, my sister, whom I loved with all my heart, died.

Anyone who says that our health care system is fine the way it is are obviously the ones that can afford good quality health care. It just astonishes me though, because it always seems that those with the most money have the – It’s your bed, now lie in it – attitude and no compassion for their fellow man. It’s so sad.

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I disagree with your mantra that the “Healthcare System is Broken”! Women’s health in the US is significantly better than in nations like Great Britain where you have fewer options to treat female cancers like breast cancer and cervical cancer. The US is the most compassionate nation on earth and even the uninsured are given high quality care. The demand for insurance, and the growing demand for a national health insurance program, will leave the control of our health to either healthcare executives or the government. I don’t like that option for either solution. I would prefer if this nation promoted a healthcare solution that placed the healthcare choices in the hands of the patient, instead of an accountant who works for an insurance or government agency!
I am suspicious of groups and organizations that want to government to meddle in the privacy and health needs of its citizens. Look at Congress and tell me who in the ranks is smart enough to craft a plan that would work! Are you kidding me? Republican or Democrat, they are all ill-prepared to address the complex health needs of this nations citizens. And as a nation, we need to understand the true cost of the healthcare that we have at our disposal. With this cost, however, come an enormous amount of options that we have to treat various illnesses. A national solution would limit our choice to control cost, which is not a good thing for women and our families! Don’t say it can’t happen, because it already exists in England, France, Germany, and Canada.
And while we debate about the growing percentage that healthcare represents to our nations GDP, have we considered how much more we use healthcare services to treat things that 30 years ago where never treated. Consider the cost of multi-organ transplants, joint replacement, artificial limbs, cancer cures, reconstructive surgeries, radiology advances and procedures that reduce the need to perform painful exploratory surgeries, and the success of the pharmaceutical industry that has brought us longer life through medicinal agents that treat our hearts, our cholesterol, our pain, our nausea, our asthma, or diabetes, and allows us to live longer than ever before. And most of these drug advances are available to us through the $4 prescription programs at most pharmacies. I think we are getting our money’s worth in healthcare today versus what options we had 30+ years ago. Now all I see are people who want to limit our choices in healthcare by moving to a single-payer plan. Shame on us for being so critical and thankless for the priviledges we have because of the healthcare options we have today. Wake up women, the men in Congress want to control your bodies through a nationalized, limited, health plan. You cannot afford to wait 12 hours in a clinic if you have a sick child in the same way they are accustomed to waiting in England; not if we have other children at home!

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Elizabeth Cox Reply:
June 23rd, 2009 at 9:51 am

@Chris Johnson, Check out these stories of our broken health care system.

http://stories.barackobama.com/healthcare. They give a human voice to the problem. Note that the majority of contributors are women.

The public health care option would not be like the British model where the government actually provides health care. The model proposed would still keep physicians in the private sector. It would just remove the profits from insurance companies and give them a reason to become more efficient. But please don’t buy into the fear mongering about European health care. My husband is English and my father-in-law has been living with skin cancer for more than a decade. He is living a dignified and independent life at the age of 84, debt free. My mother-in-law did die of breast cancer but survived with her diagnosis for over twenty years into her mid-seventies. She received warm and competent care throughout her illness, and was able to go through her experience with the dignity of no medical debt!

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Chris Johnson Reply:
June 27th, 2009 at 2:12 am

@Elizabeth Cox, according to a recent article in the Investor’s Business Daily:
- >65% of US men and women survive cancer, versus 46% in England.
93% of Americans diagnosed with diabetes receive treatment within 6 months versus 43% of Canadians and 15% Britains.
- 90% of American seniors needing a hip replacement get it within 6 months, versus 43% Canadians and 15% Britains.
- 77% of Americans needing to see a specialist are able to do so within 4 weeks, versus 43% Canadians and 40% Britains.
- There are 71 MRI/CT scanners per 1 million people in the US, versus 18 in Canada and 14 in the UK.
- only 11.7% of low income seniors in the US report their health as excellent, but only 5.8% of low income Canadian seniors report the same.

I watch President Obama’s healthcare program on ABC and was shocked that he could not give the woman who has a 105 year old mother with a pacemaker a straight answer as to whether or not, under his health care reforms, 100 year old citizens would be able to be treated with a pacemaker. He didn’t lie, but he left me feeling that under his reforms, her mother would have been denied the pacemaker, but treated with pain medications to keep her comfortable. What a shame! In addition, President Obama keeps talking about reducing the waste in repeated tests and services that are redundant and costly. I agree that these tests are wasteful, but much of this practice stems from physician orders that are being written to mitigate lawsuits. President Obama’s healthcare reforms do nothing to address medical liability; so I would assume that until this is addressed, wasteful tests and services will continue under his reforms….unless strong arm tactics are used against our doctors.

As a professional healthcare worker, I am concerned about the growing disenrollments of physicians from State Medicaid Plans and the the Medicare program throughout this country. My father-in-law had a serious stroke and is under Medicare. The internist that we want him to see will not take him because he stopped taking Medicare patients. I want my father, and everyone else who uses the healthcare system, to have the choice of seeing a qualified physician and not a nurse practitioner or physician assistant. Evidence in healthcare is beginning to show that while physician extenders such as nurse practitioners are cheaper to see, they order more tests and prescribe more drugs than medical doctors.
Do not throw out the whole healthcare system because of a small percentage of hardship cases. Instead, address the circumstances that are causing these hardships, fix the rules surrounding pre-existing conditions, and limit medical liability. That will solve the problems and save trillions of wasted tax payer dollars.

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I wholeheartedly agree with this blog. I wish I knew how to give voice to this issue. Even those with good healthcare coverage know many who are suffering significant financial loss due to inadequate or no health insurance or prohibitive insurance rates. I believe women, especially single moms, are disproportionately disadvantaged by our current system. We need the ability to buy into a healthcare option that is not tied to employment or subject to a pre-existing condition screening. I look forward to working with Momsrising to give voice to healthcare reform.

Elizabeth

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I believe you meant to say mope instead of molt.
I hope this is helpful, because you guys are really great!!

>>We can’t just sit here and molt as the ranks of the uninsured grow and families suffer devastating consequences.

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