Grants Pass Oregon/ similar places

[DutchessCottonPuff]

I am making an appt at OHSU actually .I lived in Wilsonville for a long while some years back and trying to find my old clinic. I used to go to one that was part of OHSU. I was born on a ranch in Texas in 62, so I am used to driving but the callousness people displayed at Three Rivers is shocking , they need to run a bank not a healthcare facility . You are bothering them if you show up and the dr's here are booked 4-5months out even if you are very sick . I have called everywhere , here , Medford, I will go anywhere . I got in to see a nurse practioner yesterday and she looked at me and immediately said my issues were well beyond the scope of her knowledge and wants me to see the head MD ASAP - which will be thursday a week from now , I am going to go if I am still here but am making an appt in Portland now as well , I am not holding out much hope . This is not safe , I wish I'd known before I consented to move here .
Things wouldn't have gotten to this point - I weigh 106 down from 135 at 5'6" and cannot stop the unexplained wieght loss amongst other frightening symptoms - if I could have been seen sooner - 3-4 months ago when I first started to try to see someone- Ido not think I would be in such condition and if one more person tells me they are "not giving me any controlled substances" again Iam going to flip . They all say that . All . I don't care who else they see here , I need to be taken seriously.

[Johnny Z]

You probably didn't give much consideration to Klamath Falls, but the weather isn't too bad most the time and it has lots of sunny days. I like Grants Pass better than Medford and Klamath, yet Klamath is a pretty good choice if you get the into the right neighborhood. Like any community there are bad places too. You might also check out Roseburg, it was my first choice for retirement, but that didn't work out.

[RandyinAK]

What has the air quality been in the GP/Medford area the last few years?
I am worried about buying a house and getting burned up in a wildfire.
What areas near Grants Pass are the safest?? Thank you.

[Metlakatla]

If you care about air quality at all, Southern Oregon isn't the place for you.

[Silverfall]

Originally Posted by RandyinAK

What has the air quality been in the GP/Medford area the last few years?
I am worried about buying a house and getting burned up in a wildfire.
What areas near Grants Pass are the safest?? Thank you.

Well if you were in the center of the city, that would be the safest from having your home burn in a fire, but the American Lung Association ranks cities every year and Medford-Grants Pass has been in the top 25 bad air quality cities for several years in a row. They were ranked 6th for short-term particle pollution.

As Met stated, good air quality and southern Oregon don't go together.

[ejisme]

I've only been to Medford and Grants Pass a couple of times. I would assume the bad air quality isn't a year-round issue. Right now it's probably pretty nice, unless wood stove and fireplace smoke simply replace the wildfire smoke of summer and fall.

Are there an abundance of paper or saw mills, or other industry that causes year-round air pollution in the area? Is the area prone to winter inversions that trap the pollution for long periods of time?

[Silverfall]

Originally Posted by ejisme

I've only been to Medford and Grants Pass a couple of times. I would assume the bad air quality isn't a year-round issue. Right now it's probably pretty nice, unless wood stove and fireplace smoke simply replace the wildfire smoke of summer and fall.

Are there an abundance of paper or saw mills, or other industry that causes year-round air pollution in the area? Is the area prone to winter inversions that trap the pollution for long periods of time?

The Rogue Valley sits in an inversion layer. Oregon passed a law in the early 80s to require only high-efficiency woodstoves to be sold in the state, which the current national law was modeled after. It was mostly for the air quality issues in southern Oregon where a lot of people still heat with wood. With the southern wildfires lasting for a good chunk of the summer, the particles just get trapped.

It isn't every day. It comes and goes.

[pathrunner]

Originally Posted by DutchessCottonPuff

This ^^^^, I came here from Seattle in July 18. I have lived world wide though. My husband was a 30 yr long aviation mech who got laid off due to the steel tariffs and because we are not from here and he is European. I am sick with something very bad.. possibly MS or worse and I have been laying here 3 almost 4 months waiting for help. I have had to go to the ER for care three times where they want to tranquilize me, call it anxiety, rehydrate me and send me home. They have placed bills on my stomach ( which I have paid in full ) while treating me and laughed about being called a deplorable .. which is terrifying. These people are uncivilized savages. Period. I am desperately trying to get back to Seattle or even Portland so I can get care, my labs are terribly messed up and yes I am afraid. One ER Dr took pity on me, assigned a social worker who was supposed to assign a home health worker and help coordinate therapy and try to move up a Dr visit. He also made a political comment and will now not call us back. I do not know WTF kind of place this is, but it is dangerous if you are not from here, have no family here or are not of a certain political persuasion you will not get care at all. My husband is very worried and is contemplating what to do in our youngest daughters senior year of all things.

The poster is right about the pets. I am paying what I did in Seattle for a 2bd dump here that is one of two places in the area that allows pets so I can have my 2 old cats with me. Even then the landlord would not stop trying to grill me on politics and because I love the Seahawks what my stance was on the kneeling protests. This is just way out of bounds. I want to go home badly. I don't even have family in Seattle but that doesn't matter, I want to go back now. I miss having a Dr and people who care and are aware. I am 56 and have never been so afraid. My grown kids are even afraid for me but live on the other side of the country, I am too ill to go that far now.

This has been an interesting thread, full of useful information. I once thought I'd like to move to Grants Pass in my later years. My butcher in Phoenix is from there and plans to go back after he retires. It is a beautiful area, but I didn't know about the inversion layer. After living in Portland and Phoenix, I had to admit that neither place had been good for my lung health. Concerns about proximity to specialized health care is a deal breaker for me.

That's shocking about the political talk. I moved to Alabama from California two years ago. Nobody gets in my face at all about politics. One would think otherwise. If they do start making mild referrals to politics I say I'm not interested in politics and don't follow it, though I actually do. I tell them I'm more interested in God and Jesus Christ (which is true). Both sides leave me alone after that and that's the way I want it! Personal politics is none of anybody's damn business. That was very invasive and highly unethical for a medical professional to behave that way in GP. I did have one person in Alabama make a disparaging remark about California at church, I ignored him and played dumb. Not getting into it with hateful people. Sometimes you have to leave where you are from or moved from, out of it. Sounds like that's the case here.

[Cloudy Dayz]

Originally Posted by Metlakatla

If you care about air quality at all, Southern Oregon isn't the place for you.

That depends. If you are talking about smoke, I'm not sure any place west of the Rocky Mountains is a good place anymore.

If you are talking about smog, then that would depend on location. Medford would definitely be out. Grants Pass might be borderline. I'm not sure how much of it drifts up from Medford. But the state doesn't require emissions testing in Grants Pass, so I guess that means the state is not too concerned about the air quality in Grants Pass.