Posted on 03/22/2010 8:52:30 AM PDT by Wontsubmit
For nearly a decade, Paula Oertel's brain tumor was kept at bay by a drug that was not approved to treat her condition.
Then Oertel did something she never imagined would jeopardize her good health.
She moved -- less than 30 miles -- from one county in Wisconsin to another.
That move triggered a review of her health insurance from Medicare, which eventually led to a loss of coverage, including the drug.
And the tumor returned within four months.
What happened to Oertel stunned her doctor, Dr. Mark Malkin. Nothing he learned in medical school prepared him for what now is too often a sad and frustrating part of his job as an oncologist: fighting Medicare and private insurance companies over life-or-death decisions.
Doctors aren't supposed to get emotionally involved in the cases of their patients, but tears well up in Malkin's eyes when he talks about Oertel, the 40-year-old Oshkosh woman he has been treating for several years.
"I wish Paula would have a second chance," he said, choking up.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
I wish Dr. Mark had learned to speak English.
Most people would look at this and say gummit bumbling.
The more the gummit controls the more bumbling.
As the government takes a bigger and bigger role in health care, this will happen more and more.
When government pays the bills, government makes the rules.
All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.
Oh, those heartless, profit-driven Big Insurance companies ...
Oh, wait a minute ...
huh? it parses fine to me.
Let’s be clear about this: she didn’t lose her insurance, MEDICARE refuses to pay for her treatment.
Read the Health Bill. You can keep your insurance IF and it’s a big IF.....you don’t make any changes to your policy. Once you make changes, you will loose the insurance. Just changing your address will make a difference. Soon, you will have to ask permission to change your residence. This is exactly what happened in the USSR. The government had to approve where you lived. Our government will start this with health care and then take it to the general public. It will take years but it will happen if the people let it.
Private insurance would have probably refused to pay for a drug being used in a treatment it was not designed for as well, or if it was name brand. Either way, if you don’t have cash, you are eventually pelosi’d.
Welcome to heartless Gummit HC.
Pray for America
Nonsense.
It is impossible not to have some emotional attachment to patients just as long as it doesn't cloud judgment or keep you awake at night.
I don't know where these people come up with these ideas.
Off Shore International Insurance, the Brits that can afford it buy it.
“All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.”
I’ll bet BO’s illegal alien aunt is getting free health care along with free housing and food stamps in Boston, as she fights her deportation for four years.
He and Michelle have never given a dime to all his indigent relatives, but he blasts the insurance companies who show far more compassion than government’s Medicare does.
Is it accepted by all doctors and hospitals? What type of controll does the government have over them?
One correction if you don’t mind. Government does not pay the bill; the taxpayer does.
See #16.
Medicare is usually the senior citizen health care.
She is only 40?
Something doesn’t smell right here.
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