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On a practical note, a LOT of people haven't heard about the new state-subsidized insurance pools that were created as a result of health care reform legislation. These pools make health insurance affordable to people like those described on this thread. There needs to be publicity about these plans.
But it adds 20 Million people to the medicaid rolls as well. This patient is already getting medicaid, and will continue to get it under Obamacare. Plus, there will be 20 million more who will qualify who don't qualify now. The insurance pools are for anyone else who is left over that doesn't qualify for the new looser medicaid standards.
That was my point. There are many great oncologists who take medicaid. Especially the ones who specialize in pediatric cancers. Do they have to? No, but they do. I acknowledge that it may be harder in the rural areas, but that is what these organizations are all about. As an example, if you live in upstate NY and your kid has cancer, you do what you have to do to get to Sloan. You mentioned Ronald McDonald house, who should be applauded for providing accommodations for these families in the most expensive city in the US. When one's child has cancer, they tend to seek out the best facility, and in these facilities you will find plenty of doctors that accept medicaid.
Only 10400 (as of 2007) children a year are diagnosed with cancer. Those numbers are easy to absorb by the system and make a compelling fundraising case.
I was diagnosed a month after my 23rd birthday. While there were tons of sources of funding for children or for the elderly, there was absolutely nothing for me except a paltry few hundred dollars that LLS was able to toss at me (for which I am grateful, but entirely unhelpful in the grand scheme of things). I fought through Stage IV lymphoma with minimal financial help from family (my parents couldn't even afford to let me move back home) and no practical assistance because I had just moved across the country for my first job and didn't know many people. And I repeat, there was NO help for me. I had to work full time through 6 months of chemo, even going to work the day after surgeries and working from my laptop on chemo days. I was lucky to have a supportive employer who let my productivity fall - so many adolescent and young adult cancer friends lost their jobs, and subsequently lost their insurance.
But this is about hospital ERs. Let's take my friend. He went to the ER several times with severe abdominal pain. He had just graduated from college and was working a low-paid, no benefits job until he found work. He found a job with benefits during this time, but it did not kick in for 3 months. That's why when he showed up at the hospital hemorrhaging blood out of his anus, he was just stabilized despite finding that he had Stage III colon cancer at 22 years old. Luckily he lived in Massachusetts and was able to get MassHealth, because he was fired from him job because of his illness (they never knew it was cancer, just knew he was out of the office). After having most of his colon removed and an ostomy bag put in, he started work at Whole Foods as a stockboy. He had to do this through chemo, because he had no other way to survive. There was no help for him either.
He passed away a few months ago after his cancer recurred. He and I spoke often about the spread of our diseases. Like most young adults with cancer, we were diagnosed at late stages. In his case, had the ER done ANY testing on him in the months prior to his diagnosis, he might have been caught at an earlier stage before the cancer had a chance to spread. Young adult cancers tend to be more aggressive and spread rapidly. The ER did what it was supposed to do - they stabilized and released. That's of no help to people with diseases like cancer.
Massachusetts is different because of MassHealth (which is still not easy to get, no matter what the naysayers want to believe). Had I been able to afford to go to the doctor when I felt exhausted and was dealing with increasing back pain for the 4 months I was unemployed after college graduation (the gap between college insurance and employer insurance) in Georgia, I'd have been SOL.
Only 10400 (as of 2007) children a year are diagnosed with cancer. Those numbers are easy to absorb by the system and make a compelling fundraising case.
I was diagnosed a month after my 23rd birthday. While there were tons of sources of funding for children or for the elderly, there was absolutely nothing for me except a paltry few hundred dollars that LLS was able to toss at me (for which I am grateful, but entirely unhelpful in the grand scheme of things). I fought through Stage IV lymphoma with minimal financial help from family (my parents couldn't even afford to let me move back home) and no practical assistance because I had just moved across the country for my first job and didn't know many people. And I repeat, there was NO help for me. I had to work full time through 6 months of chemo, even going to work the day after surgeries and working from my laptop on chemo days. I was lucky to have a supportive employer who let my productivity fall - so many adolescent and young adult cancer friends lost their jobs, and subsequently lost their insurance.
But this is about hospital ERs. Let's take my friend. He went to the ER several times with severe abdominal pain. He had just graduated from college and was working a low-paid, no benefits job until he found work. He found a job with benefits during this time, but it did not kick in for 3 months. That's why when he showed up at the hospital hemorrhaging blood out of his anus, he was just stabilized despite finding that he had Stage III colon cancer at 22 years old. Luckily he lived in Massachusetts and was able to get MassHealth, because he was fired from him job because of his illness (they never knew it was cancer, just knew he was out of the office). After having most of his colon removed and an ostomy bag put in, he started work at Whole Foods as a stockboy. He had to do this through chemo, because he had no other way to survive. There was no help for him either.
He passed away a few months ago after his cancer recurred. He and I spoke often about the spread of our diseases. Like most young adults with cancer, we were diagnosed at late stages. In his case, had the ER done ANY testing on him in the months prior to his diagnosis, he might have been caught at an earlier stage before the cancer had a chance to spread. Young adult cancers tend to be more aggressive and spread rapidly. The ER did what it was supposed to do - they stabilized and released. That's of no help to people with diseases like cancer.
Massachusetts is different because of MassHealth (which is still not easy to get, no matter what the naysayers want to believe). Had I been able to afford to go to the doctor when I felt exhausted and was dealing with increasing back pain for the 4 months I was unemployed after college graduation (the gap between college insurance and employer insurance) in Georgia, I'd have been SOL.
I am sorry for your illness, as well as your friend, but I have to say that what you are describing is not the norm. In fact it is so far from my own reality that I find it a little hard to believe. I have worked in 6 hospitals in my career, and have never seen the type of treatment you are describing. Your friend's severe abdominal pain should have had a surgical work up. A hospital would be foolish to send the person back out in the street as they could be sued if it is an appendix rupture or a perforated bowel. The CT scan would likely have showed them the cancer. And a bleeding bowel requires a colonoscopy, if only to be sure that the bleeding actually IS stabilized. We do these on people regardless of their insurance status just out of good medicine, but if for nothing else, to avoid a major law suit. I don't know how they are practicing medicine in your part of the country, but I can guarantee you that this is not the norm.
I am sorry for your illness, as well as your friend, but I have to say that what you are describing is not the norm. In fact it is so far from my own reality that I find it a little hard to believe. I have worked in 6 hospitals in my career, and have never seen the type of treatment you are describing. Your friend's severe abdominal pain should have had a surgical work up. A hospital would be foolish to send the person back out in the street as they could be sued if it is an appendix rupture or a perforated bowel. The CT scan would likely have showed them the cancer. And a bleeding bowel requires a colonoscopy, if only to be sure that the bleeding actually IS stabilized. We do these on people regardless of their insurance status just out of good medicine, but if for nothing else, to avoid a major law suit. I don't know how they are practicing medicine in your part of the country, but I can guarantee you that this is not the norm.
The hospitals I'm speaking of are Brigham and Women's and MGH - two of the best hospitals in the world.
What you say is true when a person is 50, even 40. But when they're 22? Food poisoning or celiac disease. When the pain stopped (because it came and went frequently), he was given a referral to a specialist that he would never fulfill see because he was uninsured.
Heck, I was insured and saw allergists and doctors for my chronically itchy skin (for 5 years), severe back pain, and fatigue. Because I never had any palpable lymph nodes until I had tumors from my collar bone to my shins (and in my bones and spine), I was never given a chest CT that would have clearly shown that I had Hodgkin's. My bloodwork was fine on the day I was diagnosed, it just required a chest x-ray. But I was 18 or 19, no one made the move to test me for cancer. Horses, not zebras.
Talk about a bigot! The OP never said what race this person was!!
Anyone that is being honest knows why I said that. I cant help what people with a deny agenda will do.
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