Rage Post -

need to let off a little steam here. Yes Im in remission, but with a 26% chance to see the next 3 years even at my current state unless I get a transplant. My story is just one more blood stain of proof that this system is so facked up, so I think Ill just give a birds eye view of the REAL health care situation in my country.

I am 27, I make and have made over $250,000-$320,000 the last 4 years and as a sole proprietor I declined the expensive insurence during my first year of being a small business owner/poker player and within a few months was diagnosed with non-hosk. lymphoma. The share of cost Medicade that I received worked WONDERFULLY for about a year in a half. Then the gov. basically said enough, and has left me to the 26% chance that I do not relapse. I have been in 4 stem cell transplants and SENT HOME because the gov. would decline a medicine that I HAD to have in order for the treatment to continue. This circle of events started in April of last year, and is still going on now. It is shear luck that I have not relapsed yet, and even now they are delaying the new upcoming transplant for the same reasons.

I went to the hospital and offered up a large sum of money (100k) to cover the rest of the transplant in September, and they even declined that!!!(if i give anything, i lose ALL coverage even for the stuff they had been giving me to keep me alive thus far).

So yeah, im a little bit enraged. I come from a very extreme right wing family and even my own parents do not think that the "evil left wing non christians" (sigh ignorance) have any good intentions with this new health proposal, and even THEY do not want a change! This angers me even more. Their own son, along with thousands of others just like me, are going to die unless something changes and fast.

the point of this post is to show that even people who actually live around the 90-97% of income in this country, STILL end up dieing due to the system we still have here in place under the right(wrong) circumstances. The lies of the death panels, the fear that one party injects into the minds of their own people, it makes me want to vomit. The Glen Becks of the world who while being paid by CNN will state that the health care is the worse thing going, and then get hired by other company and 9 months later state the opposite, this gives me anger so high that I have to take a zanax to get over the hatred I now have for the propaganda of both "wings" of our country. Its sickening. Its enraging, and its even harder to sit back and watch TV and see all of this unfold. There IS a reason why we are trying to change the system. It doesnt mean we are communist/socialist or whatever.

If I get sent home again this year in the middle of my transplant, myself and 50 others (some who are in the same situation) will be marching shirtless outside of DC in March. So far there has not been enough people standing up and sticking up for themselves, not enough voices of those who actually are paying the penelty for the system are speakiing. This will change quickly and Ill die trying to get our voices heard if thats what it takes.

(the shirtless part would be to show the ports, the pick lines, the whole ordeal, I have 4 hanging off me or under my skin along with multiple scars where I have had to have ribs removed etc.)

Sorry, I don't mean to be disrespectful, as I know this is a very personal issue for you, but I'm confused as to how this new health care plan is going to fix this problem - you mentioned Medicaid - is the gov't currently in charge of your healthcare, then? Who is it that is denying you these things? Private insurance? Medicaid? From your post, it sounds as if the gov't is the one denying you care - how is giving them more control over healthcare going to fix anything?

Have you thought about hiring a patient advocate and/or a lawyer. A person dealing with getting well and taking care of a family is going to find it difficult to deal with the issues that arise between healthcare providers, the government, and insurance companies. What I don't understand is that the problems you describe are caused by medicare and medicaid, government run programs. Now you are in favor of giving more control to them and believing that they can fix anything.

 

Originally Posted by dolphin13

medicaid sucks and needs to be reworked

i absolutely agree -if Medicaid and Medicare actually worked, we wouldn't need such sweeping reform - wonder who runs Medicaid/Medicare? let's give them more control!

*answer to pigalet*

medicade. I have a share of cost method. On one side its fantastic. I can get a PETCT scan which costs over 5 grand, it covers my "share of cost" and for that whole month, I can get treatment that gets billed to the medicaid and not have to pay a dime(i am responsible for roughly $2500 a month with the share of cost).

I declined the private insurence for a few reasons.. It might be my death sentence. I stated that the last 4 years I had been making very good money, but when I was offered the insurence, I was JUST starting to make good, and didnt want to throw 1k a month into an insurence i might never need(cause id never been sick), especially when my company was very small and could of died out. When my wife was 4 months pregnant(only 5 years ago), we had to sleep on the floor in a slum with no bed, nearly homeless. A year later, I had ballzed up and had found good source of incomes, but was VERY scared of being poor again, so ended up not taking the insurence for those reasons.

what ends up happening with medicaid is this. Most people can get through a transplant without toooo many complications. However my body after 300 hours of chemo is no longer able to take the transplant normally. In order for it to work i need a drug that although expensive has a 98% rate of sucess. I keep getting denied this and sent home 2-3 weeks into the transplant. There might not be a bigger blow to your emotions that to deal with being sent home by the government, just to turn on your TV and watch what used to be your own party lie to the american people just to get their own agenda across(mainly bashing the other side).

that's a sucky situation and my heart goes out to ya.

Did you say you had a wife and infant and refused to buy insurance? not judging, just asking since you put it out there.

And yes, our healthcare system is in shambles and getting worse daily. But working in the field i can tell you honestly that the government denies coverage way more than the private insurers do. Don't believe all the lies they are telling you, something needs to be done, but it's hard to tell who you can trust any more.

Pigalet said exactly what I was trying to say, only better and in a more concise way. <3 pigalet

I'll make my first post since "leaving" because this thread is worth it.

My heart and soul are with you OP. It is beyond words, but you did a much better job of describing your anger than I did in the past. I am a Stage IV B Hodgkins survivor, and I would like to say that Non-Hodgkins is so much tougher to beat; YOU ARE SO STRONG AND BRAVE DON"T GIVE UP NOW!!!

Keep this fighting spirit in every second of your life. This anger that you have, I have and still feel. Being left out to dry/die isn't a good feeling. I have tried to share the horror stories of what I went through legally/medically but most people wouldn't believe it, but listen to the OP people.

You will beat this last hurdle, you will become a strong voice, I truly believe it! My thoughts are with you and your family.

 

Originally Posted by ecugirl93

Are you people who are in favor of gov't sponsored healthcare blind or just stupid??? Did you READ the OP??? He isn't having these problems with private insurance, as he declined to purchase it. He is having these problems with GOVERNMENT SPONSORED HEALTHCARE.

Lol that's what I was thinking. I'm gonna have to go with stupid.

I lost my dad to non hodgkins lymphoma. Well, it wasn't the cancer that killed him, it was the chemo that eventually broke his body down so this issue hits close to home for me. He was a veteran and was treated at the VA in birmingham, one of the top VAs in the country. I pleaded with him to go to UAB hospital to get checked out because i felt they were misdiagnosing him, and just pumping him with pain pills. UAB is the place that found out what was wrong, immediately started treating him for it and extended his life by 5 years. The VA diagnosed him with back pain and sciatica.

Wow, just wow...

I hope things turn out alright for you. You seem to have some means - have you considered looking into getting care in other countries. I know, for example, some people go to countries like India where they have vacation/surgery programs set up for various treatments.

I don't know why the richest country in the world hasn't been able to figure out how to develop an effective health care system like every other developed country in the world.

I am glad I live in Canada, truly I am.

Let me preface: I am deeply sorry for your circumstances. I'm not gonna embellish, cause it would just sound fake anyway. That being said, I have no problem calling you out where I feel you are mistaken or misguided. I've suffered enough in my life that I don't pussyfoot around anyone, even dying people.

You say you're an entrepreneur. How much would the health care you require to live, or may require in the future, cost? Now, extend that to all the people who will require that kind of care to stay alive. Consider all the baby boomers reaching Probably Would Die Without Medical Intervention age. How do we handle these costs? Do we let the market work, which will mean some very, very sick people will die (but at least try to limit suffering)? Or do we just pay for everyone's care, bankrupting our country? Or do we legislate costs down, so being in the medical profession is no longer profitable, and we lose a generation of doctors and researchers? These are the choices we have to make, and we can't allow individual stories to determine the best choice for everyone's freedom, right to choose, and health.

Some of this is the result of your choices. You say you declined health care cause you were afraid of returning to poverty. That was your choice, and the risk you took. It seems rather unfair for you to essentially want a do-over now just because your circumstances changed. I also come from a poor background, and I've never been without health insurance, which was a good decision because I would up developing Spinal Stenosis, and would be in mind-numbing, crippling pain today without the covered medications and surgeries. We both made health care decisions. To go back and rig the game now because you don't like the outcome basically shits all over my decision. Yep, it's unfair that you have cancer. It's also unfair that I'm an orphan with a fucked-up back.

Honestly, I have a hard time believing that having $100,000 cash on hand still leaves you out in the cold. I agree 100% that you need some sort of advocate to work with your. Considering the average payouts from medicare/medicaid, I have to believe you can find someone or someplace that can help you.

The sad truth of this existence is that you, buchsbaumy, are going to die. Yep. You're life is nearly over. Welp... so is mine. So is everyone else reading this. On the grand scale of the universe, our lifetimes reduce to zero. Our biggest task, our greatest work, therefore, should not be to expend all of our efforts putting off the inevitable, but to take the time we are all granted and use it to the fullest, making life better for the highest possible number of people.

Of course your personal situation is most pressing to you, it always is. However, for the same reason that we shouldn't let victim's right criminal legislation (Megan's Law and the like are disasters, for example), we as a country cannot allow sick people to write health care legislation. I appreciate your perspective, but your pending medical issues do not make the flimsy case for expanding government health care any more trenchant.

Again, I don't mean to attack you, simply to present the other side.

 

Originally Posted by Buchsbaumy

I know that other side of this arguement is that it will give the gov. MORE control. But I think imho that all the fear of "more control leading to socialism" is just a fear tactic. We dont feel the same way about car insurence amoung other things.

Speak for yourself.

Actually it can get worse, but that's neither here nor there - I think your response highlights one of the big problems with this new healthcare legislation for many - it's change for the sake of change being rushed through because ppl feel they have to do SOMETHING - even if it leads to further disaster

I thought the new bill got rid of the public option - now the gov't is forcing every citizen to buy a service from private companies - and don't buy the hype from your own side either, the new plan will not let you keep your current plan indefinitely