BAD MEDICINE
My aunt Virginia lives in Pennsylvania. She's 77. Her husband died young. She's raised 3 kids on her own. Overall she's had not the greatest life. Worked hard. Always paid her bills, including her insurance premiums. She's been having heart problems. After a lot of suspicious medical care, doctors finally gave her surgery this week for a pacemaker. I'm getting details second hand so I apologize if some of this is inaccurate, but a family member tells me normally a pacemaker is placed under the skin, but she's lost so much weight, she's skin and bones, they had to cut through the muscle to place it deeper. The healing process for muscle is a lot more painful I'm told. So this was on Monday morning. Two days later she had to be taken back to the hospital with difficulty breathing and a lot of other problems. They found out a wire from the pacemaker was mispositioned or had come loose, and that they had to do the surgery all over again the next morning. So just 3 days after the surgery, she was being sent in for another surgery. That second surgery was delayed all day; they didn't complete it till about 3 that afternoon. Then...THEY SENT HER HOME. I was horrified that a 77 year old woman could have two surgeries three days apart and be sent home four hours later. I don't know if this is an insurance mandate. I don't know if this is a bad hospital policy of revolving door medicine. All I know is by 11 pm that night, she was back in an ambulance being rushed back to the hospital with slurred speech, confusion, shortness of breath, you name it. And this morning they still don't know what's wrong. I just can't believe how quickly they throw you out of the hospital. I imagine everyone has a story like this.
posted by Jeff Deminski at
3:00 PM
16 Comments:
"I imagine everyone has a story like this". No, can't say I do.
July 18, 2008 8:08 PM
Wow Deminski, that sucks. Health care in this country is a mess, as greed has gotten the upper hand, to the great detriment of everyone in need of it.
Greed really rules in this country - all hail the mighty American Way :-(
July 18, 2008 8:33 PM
Sorry to hear that Jeff. My father in-law just had a heart attack a month ago. They told him he was fine for 2 days, then all of a sudden another doctor took a look and it turned out he had 3 arteries 98% blocked and another 90% blocked. He went in for his bypass and is now doing better.
My grandfather inlaw, on the other hand, recently died. He had an obstructed bowel, so they performed the surgery. 5 days after the surgery he wasn't recovering, and they "missed a spot". They re-did the surgery and he died several days after that.
I have a lot of family all over the world, and stories like this seem out of this world to them. They don't have to pay these fees. They know that if they are sick, they can go to the hospital for little or no money and be taken care of properly - regardless of their financial status.
I wish you and your aunt the best of luck.
July 18, 2008 9:33 PM
Oh my goodness.... does she have anyone to speak for her, a relative maybe that is there.. they should not have sent her home, that is just crazy!! If there is someone there for her, tell them to speak up and don't take that crap, you do have some say!!
July 19, 2008 12:46 AM
What a coincidence. I just spent 10 HOURS in the ER yesterday with my 74 year old Mother-in-law who had a seizure. She had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's since 2005, and they think that the seizure was a side affect of the illness. While the doctors were bumble-dicking around, I had to comfort a befuddled, worried (and because they were trepidatious about giving her food, malnourished) old woman. All the while, the waiting room was ass deep with ailing folk (one was given a plastic bucket to puke in), and the nurses and doctors were doing everything in their power to wander around aimlessly and look stupid. When my wife and I finally left, they still hadn't fed her nor administered the medicine she needs to treat her illness. They had simply drugged her. For this wonderful service, we'll have to pay upwards of $5000-$6000. What a damn deal! Yes, the system is broken. It's an F-in shame...
July 19, 2008 10:11 AM
LOL @ "bumble-dicking"
July 19, 2008 1:40 PM
Do you know that Beaumont Hospital releases masectomy patients the same day, too? A dear friend of mine was sent home within 24 hours of a masectomy - and they did it again a month later when they removed the other breast. Incredible!
July 20, 2008 1:48 PM
Need more details to be definitive, but let me take a shot at it. If she is 77 she has Medicare. Medicare pays hospitals a lump sum per discharge, so once she qualified for the original admission she ceased being revenue and became expense. Whether she was there two days or twenty the hospital is paid the same, so they are incentivized to get her out the door. They are not paid for multiple admissions for the same reason so close together, so it is more cost effective to treat the follow-up on an outpatient basis, hence sending her home. By the way - she sounds symptomatic for a mini-stroke, which is not uncommon under those circumstances at that age.
The healthcare delivered in America is amongst the best in the world, but its administration is incredibly inefficient. It also varies significantly by economic class, meaning that if you have money you can buy much better healthcare. But that’s true of anything – if you have money you have a better house, car, food, clothes, etc… It is a purchased privilege, not a “right.” That’s why Magic Johnson was infected with the HIV virus in 1991 and is fine today – he has the $35,000 a month for the meds. And its why roughly a third of the residents in the sub Sahara will die soon (not to mention the inner city Americans). Darwinism is a nasty bitch.
As far as free health care, there is no such thing anywhere – it is just a matter of how you are paying for it. Most westernized countries have socialized medicine that is paid via taxes and administered by the government – we are really the only one uses private industry (private sector hospitals and the insurance you get through work). The socialized model rarely works – the Scandinavian countries are really the only ones that have done well with it. Rich Canadians come here all the time for treatment because access is so limited there. The rest of them just die inexpensively. Our own experiments with it – Medicare and Medicaid – are unmitigated disasters, as your story aptly demonstrates.
Hope your aunt is okay. I know people at most of the major delivery systems in Pennsylvania – let me know where she’s at - I’ll make some inquiries…
July 20, 2008 6:28 PM
Hey Jeff,
I'm sorry to hear about your Aunt, I hope all goes well for you.
You know what's crazy? As I was reading your post, my husband and his friend were talking about the exact same thing.
Our friend's son just had brain surgery. He's only 14 years old. Long story short, they sent him home only a few days, after brain surgery? Thats crazy! The doctors approached the dad and said his insurance would run out in two days. He said he would sell his house in order to pay for a few more days in the hospital. It's a sad day when someone with MAJOR surgery can't even stay as long as they should.
Another friend of ours son was shot in the chest for his ipod. That's another story in itself, but anyway the bullet bounced around inside him and injured organs and all kinds of stuff. He had all kinds of survery, they left the bullet in and sent him home not even a few days later. I couldn't believe.
I can't believe it, the insurance companies rule the world. Well at least in the US.
July 20, 2008 9:11 PM
Hey Jeff, I work at the Michigan Heart and Vascular institute in Ann Arbor (granted, just at the info desk) and with pacemakers/defibrillators the stay is usually what they call a 23hour (but it is usually less then that) Yep mostly due to insurance companies.
A lead not connected correctly or falling out of place is actually not too uncommon.
I wish her well.
July 21, 2008 7:08 AM
DeathPool is absolutely, 100% right. Anonymous #2 and #4 seem to be advocating "free" healthcare. Do you people advocating "free" healthcare realize nothing is free? Canadians pay between 16% and 28% sales tax, depending on what you are buying (and no the higher rate is NOT only one alcohol and cigarettes). They pay much much higher income and property taxes, not to mention the unbelievably high business taxes they pay (which is passed on to the people in the form of higher prices). And every year the services, treatments, and medications covered by their "free" healthcare get cut because the system is bleeding money.
You will never meet a bigger bunch of hypochondriacs as the general Canadian people either. If they have a sniffle they go to the doctor and because so many people are going to the doctor for such minor things it easily takes a month if not more to get an appointment.
My father-in-law had cancer (he lived in Canada) it had gone into remission for 2 years and he started feeling bad again so they thought it may have begun growing again. They needed an MRI to find out, the soonest appointment he could get for an MRI was 4 months, here, you can get it within a week. He died waiting for the MRI. My wife, who lived under the Canadian system most of her life now lives here and uses the U.S. healthcare system, she wouldn't have it any other way. She insists her father would still be alive today had he lived here.
The first time I went to a Canadian hospital with her I was in complete shock. It was like walking into a secretary of state’s office here. Everyone, doctors, nurses, it didn't matter, they all acted as if they worked for the government, probably because they did. There was literally no one in this ER, not a soul and it still took us 1.5 hours to get in back and another .5 hours before the doctor came in.
Be careful of what you wish for. They can tell you it will be different here but it won't be. In fact, I bet it would be worse. There are literally 10 times more people here and we all know how well the government is managing the Social security system and that’s is simple compared to managing healthcare. If they tell you that rich people and businesses are going to pay for it you better think again. Businesses don't pay taxes, only people pay taxes. Any increase in taxes to businesses will cause one of three things to happen: The business adds it to the cost of its product or service, if they can no longer compete because of too high of prices then they go under or move to where they can.
Think of this too, do you know how many companies participate in the building of a single car? It isn't just GM or Ford, there are hundreds if not thousands of companies involved. If they all got hit with just a 10% tax increase I would venture to say none of us could afford a car.
So don’t be fooled, nothing is free and when you are talking about healthcare you are not just talking about the financial cost. I don’t think you want the government telling your doctor how to treat you any more then you do the insurance companies. In fact I think I would rather have the insurance company doing it. At least when they are making decisions they have to keep in mind how many subscribers will drop them and switch carriers if they make the wrong decision. And in many cases they got the healthcare industry to actually do a better job then what they were. Just in my life I have seen the healthcare system evolve and grow into something remarkable, maybe not perfect but if they can’t cure or fix something they look for a way they can.
Try calling the government and complain about something you don’t like, see how far that gets you. Healthcare will become stagnate, only certain hospitals will get certain equipment and if you happen to need that equipment you will have to travel to it. Oh, and that travel, it is NOT covered under your “free” healthcare. Only certain Canadian hospitals have certain equipment. My father-in-law had to travel an hour and a half away 2 times a week for chemo, and he didn’t have a car or a drivers license. He had to take taxi’s, or see if anyone he knew was going that way, etc. Canada doesn’t have much of a public transit system either. Even all his testing had to be done there because the local hospital wasn’t equipped for it.
So when you are done dreaming of your Utopia of “free” healthcare go check into the facts, and I don’t mean from the left blogs and news services (I don’t mean the right leaning ones ether) . Go spend a few days in Canada and look at your receipts when you buy things. Ask around about the healthcare system. Don’t ask them if they like it, most will say yes, because they don’t have anything to compare it to. Or worse, they heard horror stories about our system and how we have millions dying daily because they can’t afford healthcare, blah blah blah. You could probably get answers on the Internet too. You just have to take things with a grain of salt, depending on the source. But I am sure you could filter through all the rhetoric and come to the truth.
Global Warmer
July 21, 2008 12:27 PM
I had reconstructive knee surgery in May. Not a huge ordeal I admit, but, I couldn't even balance and they were PUSHING me out of the hospital. I had only been awake 35 minutes and they were kicking me out. I was still loopy, couldn't balance and they wanted me to walk on crutches....To be serious...I checked in at 7:30, surgery started around 9, was 90 minutes in length, and I was being pushed out at 11:30.
July 21, 2008 1:05 PM
man, my mom was just released today after spending 6 days in the hospital for liver problems. Sounds like an eternity compared to some of these stories!
July 21, 2008 7:45 PM
Modern medicine is a wonderful thing if you have the money to pay for it.
speaking of aunts, how is your horny aunt marty doing?
July 23, 2008 12:57 PM
I was horrified to read this. Yes, I have similar stories also, and each one is maddening. It's a crime when it happens to anyone, but especially someone you love in your family. I also just had a girlfriend deliver a baby in a hospital out of state. She was discharged just shy of 24 hrs. When she stood up to leave, she fainted. All they did was help her up and put her in a wheelchair and pushed her to the door, with her newborn in her arms. It's very wrong. Thanks for bringing up the topic. I'm so sorry about your aunt. :-(
July 29, 2008 11:09 AM
That's seriously messed Jeff, sorry to hear that...
Most people, if not everyone has a story like this to share... My fiancé's 21 year old cousin had an accident last week and the outcome was rather horrifying as well... He lives in Canada and works as an apprentice electrician. While working on a building, he fell 25 feet through a sky light and ended up breaking his hip, his collar bone, a few ribs, he has a "slight skull fracture", and ruptured his spleen. The doctors sent him home with band aids and oxycontin and told him to come back if he passes urine in his blood... Canada. Talk about a third world country.
August 5, 2008 6:45 PM
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