Fighting Cancer: Occupy Healthcare

Mom’s started back on her chemo treatments this past week. She’s with a new doctor now. The only explanation she’s received about why Medicare denied her treatments over a month ago was a typo… A simple typo, made by the doctor’s office on the paperwork that was sent in to Medicare. For over a month she waited patiently, losing strength and weight. Finally, she took the advice of a cancer advocate and found a new doctor who said he’d treat her. Suddenly, her former doctor’s office called and admitted to the mistake and told her she could come back tomorrow and resume her chemo, but by then Mom had already made up her mind to switch doctors.

And still no one has apologized or explained why she couldn’t have continued her chemotherapy as planned while the various parties discussed the discrepancy in the paperwork. A human being’s health and well-being were completely forgotten in all this mess—a mess that she didn’t cause, doesn’t understand, and was never in any, way, shape or form responsible for.

So… who is responsible? She had made such strides in her first  two months of chemotherapy and was actually starting to feel somewhat better and her appetite had improved. She hadn’t felt the need for any painkillers until this past week, when the pains that had first alerted her to the cancer returned. Who is responsible for Mom’s declining health? Who is responsible for this debacle?

I guess the answer to who is responsible depends on what side of the “99% versus 1%” argument you favor.

If you’re in the 1%: “Of course it’s the 77 year old lady’s fault. She would have never allowed herself to become sick in the first place if she had her own vegan chef  and bimonthly trips to the health spa. Barring that, she should have more than enough money in the bank to purchase the best of health insurances and the best of health care… No depending on government programs necessary, unless you already have the politicians in your pocket. And if anyone causes you any guff—well, that’s what expensive lawyers are for. That’ll get you results. Good manners? Patience? Pfft! Those are for those who can’t afford to have their own way!”

If you’re in the 99%: “I followed all the rules, paid Social Security taxes all my life. I asked my doctor why I was experiencing these horrible pains in my abdomen, and he said he could only do certain tests because that’s all Medicare/my insurance would pay for and those tests didn’t give him any results he could interpret, and I can’t afford to pay out of pocket for more testing…”  OR  “I followed all the rules, paid Social Security taxes, but I’m not old enough to receive Medicare, and I’m unemployed and have no health insurance, and I can’t get any doctor to see me and diagnose these horrible pains…”

I think that pretty much sums up healthcare in the good ol’ US of A, don’t you?

The single-payer system where everyone can walk into a doctor’s office and receive the treatment they need—not what they can afford to pay without filing bankruptcy—makes more sense than ever. “But who will pay for it?” the 1% asks, pulling out their checkbooks and writing checks to political action committees. “We’re all paying for it,” reply the 99% who pay more and more in insurance premiums and taxes and receive less and less actual healthcare.

Face it—we ALL have been paying for it. And who has profited from this set-up? Our ever-advertising pharmaceutical industry and private health insurance companies. They continue to make record profits while everyday Americans continue going broke and making decisions like, “Heat or eat this winter?”

If there hasn’t been an “Occupy Healthcare” group sitting in front of a hospital or clinic somewhere, there should be.

What's your take on this issue? Are you making "heat or eat this winter?" decisions? Are you tired of not being able to afford to see a doctor, dentist and/or eye doctor? Are you happy you have a good insurance policy for you and your loved ones and don't care how your fellow citizens suffer? Don't be afraid to speak up in the comment section below.

Fighting Cancer: Battling Bureaucratic Bull-Hockey

I'd meant to give an update earlier on Mom's battle with Medicare in regard to her remaining chemo treatments, but there's been no change in her status. It's been over three weeks, and there's been no word from Medicare. Mom calls her doctor's office and the Cancer Patient Services everyday to see what all she do to help expedite the process, but other than filling out more paperwork to appeal the decision Medicare made to stop her chemo, there seems to be nothing else for her to do but wait. Wait and grow weaker.

We've since learned that Medicare is suppose to make a decision within two weeks (14 days) of being notified that the doctor and patient are appealing their decision. The doctor's office manager assures us that the appeal was made the day they learned of Medicare's halting Mom's treatment. It's been 24 days since her last treatment as of today, so it appears Medicare bureaucrats can't read a calendar.

Mom received some papers from the government which stated that if her health or life were in jeopardy then Medicare would make a decision within 72 hours (3 days). Okay, her health is in jeopardy--she even admitted to me over Thanksgiving that she felt "weak like I did before I started the chemo." It breaks my heart. Her appetite had been improving and everyone had remarked that she looked a lot better. Now this... Obviously Medicare bureaucrats interpret having cancer as a "minor illness" and not something that needs to be treated agressively and without delay.

Today my chiropractor (who I turn to for help since she doesn't discriminate against people like me without health insurance) tells me that she had to stop taking Medicare payments. She said she'll treat patients for free rather than risk a $10,000 possible fine from Medicare for filing "fraudulent claims" if she forgets to cross a T or dot an I on their forms. I guess Medicare doesn't like to pay for chiropractic adjustments anymore, either, and will use any excuse to put a chiropractor out of business.

Wonderful. I'm sure the pharmaceutical industry has had some hand in this decision. You wouldn't want folks to feel better without the benefit of pain pills and other unnecessary chemicals in their bodies, would you? Well, only if you're making billions of dollars each month off of hooking patients onto prescription drugs, that is...

Every day it seems more and more obvious to me that the current health care situation is a joke. Private insurance companies routinely refuse to pay for treatments and medicines, Medicare seems ready to pull the plug after a short period of treatment, and doctors and chiropractors are forced to deal with crippling paperwork that prevent them from healing their patients.

When is this going to end, people? Is health care a right that all should enjoy or just a perk for the priviledged few? Don't be too fast in answering--how do you know that tomorrow you're still going to be in the "priviledged class"? An upside down mortgage or a company downsizing might knock you to the bottom of the heap like it's done to many of your fellow citizens. No one should think they're safe in this day and age when it comes to affordable and decent health care.

I caught a title of a book in passing online the other day, How Medicare Killed My Father. I don't want it to have a sequel, but short of a miracle and some human compassion from the Medicare bureaucrats who make these life and death decisions to stop/start medical treatments, what else can we do?

Bureaucrats: The first against the wall when the revolution comes... if it ever comes.

Fighting Cancer: Money Matters More Than Medicine

I wasn’t sure when I’d write again about Mom’s cancer battle, but today’s fiasco has inspired me. And I’m definitely not inspired in a good way. To put it bluntly, it was made more than obvious to us that in the eyes of Medicare money matters more than medicine.

Mom’s been undergoing chemotherapy since August, and according to the doctor and oncology nurses she’s been doing quite well on the drugs they’ve been infusing her with. While no one can honestly say that she’s out of the woods yet, she’s been making good progress and her doctor had scheduled her for more chemo sessions and another body scan in a couple of weeks. You can imagine our surprise then when we walked into the office for her weekly chemo session and the young office manager was forced to inform us, “Sorry, we can’t treat you today. Medicare says you can’t have any more chemotherapy.”

Of course they’ll fax in documents and medical notes and what-not to the paper-pushers at Medicare, but who’s to say that Medicare won’t take their sweet ol’ time deciding if additional chemo sessions are worth it? What’s six months to a career bureaucrat? It’s a water cooler break! But what’s six months to a cancer patient not getting treatment? I guess Medicare doesn’t shed any crocodile tears if the patient isn’t alive when they finally make their decision.

Mom is fortunate that she has supplemental private health insurance, but for some reason it won’t pay its 20% unless Medicare pays its portion first, and if Medicare isn’t paying… Then of course that means they don’t pay, either. I can’t figure that out—you pay expensive premiums for insurance that doesn’t pay when you need it? Sounds like something from a classic Monty Python sketch, “The auto insurance that only works if you don’t use it” sketch. It seems at this point if Mom wants to continue to get better and receive chemo treatments, she’ll have to pay out of pocket. Unfortunately, our last name isn’t “Gates”, so she doesn’t have an endless bank account.

I know Mom’s case isn’t unique. I’m certain that every day thousands—maybe millions—of Americans are told that they are no longer worthy of receiving life-saving medications or medical treatments. It seems to me our government has found a rather unique way to cull the “surplus population” (as Ebenezer Scrooge labeled them in Dickens’s classic A Christmas Carol). The U.S. may not force you into having abortions and sterilization procedures like the Chinese do to prevent population growth, but instead it waits until you’re retirement age and then it lets you waste away from lack of healthcare. It allows you to labor as the working poor without any health benefits with the freedom of keeling over in your tracks if you happen to get sick. How kind.

I saw an “Occupy Findlay, Ohio” group camped out in front of the Hancock County Courthouse this morning. It seems even in small town America people have had enough of an uncaring government and want to make their voices heard. Maybe Mom and I should join them?

 

Please feel free to share your experiences with Medicare, unresponsive health insurers, and other injustices the 99% of us endure on a daily basis in the comments section below.

Please pass this blog/link along to others who feel put upon similarly. If we create enough noise, perhaps someone somewhere in a position of power will grant us justice.

In any case, even if we’re not here to see the results of the revolution, perhaps we can help start it.

Feel free to join our Facebook page, The Mad-As-Hell Party. Let the politicos know we’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore!