Lend A Hand

Back in the 1940s the medical world experienced the miracle of widely available antibiotics. The number of fatalities from infections went down and the length of the average infection illness shortened dramatically. Antibiotics were hailed as the “best thing since sliced bread” (well not really) and doctors began prescribing them for all sorts of illnesses.

What tended to happen when a person would go to the doctor with a virus (which is not affected by antibiotics) patients would want something (antibiotics) from the doctors. Sometimes doctors would feel pressured to write a prescription. Other times they would write a prescription just in case the patient had an infection while the tests went to the lab. Antibiotics were good for you, right? What could taking antibiotics hurt?

Years later we began to find out. Misuse and overuse of antibiotics led to bacterium becoming more resistant and more resistant until common antibiotics stopped working. Stronger medication was need to kill the infections which in turn made the bacterium more resistant and the vicious circle continued.

Nearly 100,000 people die every year because of these superbugs. Infections that were once almost exclusively found in hospitals (such as the deadly MRCA) are now infecting people in other common shared areas like schools and recreation centers.

Despite the frightening reality of these superbugs there are things you can do to lessen the chance of acquiring a resistant superbug when going for a doctor’s visit or hospital for surgery. Start by realizing that you have to stick up for yourself and be assertive when it comes to demanding the highest standard of care for you. Don’t be afraid to ask doctors and nurses to wash their hands before examining you or handling you in any way. Avoid shaving any area that will be operated on and insist tat your medical caregiver use clippers instead of a razor to remove any necessary hair. The reason for this is razors leave tiny cuts on the surface of skin that can allow bacteria to enter.

Ask your doctor or nurse to remove any IVs or tubes as soon as possible after surgery. These tubes are an easy way for superbugs to get into your body. Finally, work with doctors and nurses in order to get well as quickly as possible to reduce exposure. Out of the hospital you should frequently wash your hands or use hand sanitizer (the best way to prevent infection). If you do get sick with a virus, a cold or an allergy, don’t ask your doctor for antibiotics – they won’t help you.

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It seems like the media is jammed with statistics about Americans with no health insurance. Last I heard something like 50 million people were uninsured. That makes the other 250 million of us the lucky ones, right?

Not always. While I strongly believe that all people should be insured, I also believe they should have decent insurance. In fact, I believe there should be universal single-payer health coverage in America just like there is in most other developed countries…but that is a blog topic for another day.

Trust me when I say that it is not only the uninsured that are suffering in this country. The poorly insured are being squeezed in the worst way too.

Let me illustrate by telling you about my family’s health insurance (if you can even call it that). I’ll start by saying that we pay a $346 premium every month. We have a major insurer (who shall remain nameless) but we also have a $6000 deductible. So my husband’s company pays $5000 of that deductible (as part of the premium) through another company which is not an insurance company but who provides us with cards that we have to present to health care providers along with our main health insurance cards if we want coverage.

As a side note, explaining all this to every health care provider we go to is enough to give me a migraine…oops, another doctor’s visit.

Now in addition to paying the premium and the $1000 deductible, we also pay a $25 copay for office visits, $100 for emergency room visits and 20% of our prescription costs. I won’t get into our dental coverage but trust me when I say it is worse than the medical insurance if not quite as complicated.

All told our health insurance costs my family of five an average of $584.33 a month – more than any other bill except our mortgage. It’s a good thing there’s no monetary conversion for aggravation or the insurance company would owe us money.

I sincerely hope that when Barack Obama becomes president next year, he changes the system for the better but in the meantime I’ll have to grit my teeth and be grateful that we have insurance at all….oh and I’ll keep writing letters.

If you’re getting aggravated about your insurance, leave a comment with your story or email me and I’ll write a compilation post in the future with the most ridiculous injustices.

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