Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
My wife and I are both in our late 80s, and we moved from big city life to a more rural town, 50 miles to a city of 100,000. We have a large independent grocery store/drug store, a hardware store, for our basic needs. There is a tire store, and an auto dealer in town that can take care of our vehicles, and a gas station. We buy non perishable groceries on line, and our other needs the same. A lot simpler than driving 50 miles each way in one direction, and 90 miles each way the other to go shopping.
The hospital is new, but more for basic care, and is a trauma center, and as part of the building there is a medical center with 4 doctors. It is 50 miles to the city for a great hospital which our local hospital,medical center is part of the medical system. The medical system has ambulances, and one of the few medical systems in the country, that owns its 2 air ambulance helicopters, plus 3 twin turbo air ambulance airplanes that allow this to be the major hospital system for northern half of Wyoming, The Western half of the Dakotas, Montana, and a Big Section of Southern Canada. It is good enough, it has been accepted as one of only 7 medical systems in the U.S. as an affiliate of the Mayo Clinic. Some specialists from the big hospital in the city such as my cardiologist , come here once or twice a month holding office hours. We have a teleconference room with a fantastic setup of test equipment, where a specialist in the city or May Clinic, can have a local technician administer tests with the patient hooked up here at the hospital, and the Specialist supervising everything including the instruments hooked up for the test are being read directly by the specialist when needed.
Our basic needs are being taken care of, our medical needs are taken care of, and we can do our shopping on line.
We have a housekeeper that comes in 3 days a week to care for our 3700 sq. ft. 4 level (not stories) home that has had 3 chair lifts installed so we don't have to climb chairs. If and when needed, she is always standing by if we need to be driven somewhere using our car. We have an acre landscaped out of our 5 acre property which is directly across the county road from best area of town, and our housekeepers teen age son care for it in the summer (one son has grown and left the area and the second son now has that job). Our tractor drops the mower in the winter, and our snow blade is attached to keep us plowed out when it snows and the yard boy does it. Her family has been with us for 5 years, and is more like a granddaughter than an employee. We pay her well, at $18 an hour, and we are her only one she works for.
I am telling about ourselves, to show that older people can live very well in rural areas, if they are careful and pick a rural area, where they can have what they need, or have easy access to. On Line Shopping, makes it even easier to live rural. Instead of having to go away to shop, I have not found anything we have needed including things like a part for the lawn mower, etc., we cannot get on line and usually at a better price. My wife's coffee maker just blew up, so a few minutes ago, I ordered her a new one to be here on Wednesday for about half of what I could buy one at the local hardware store. The stores are only 1 mile from our home, but I ordered on online in less time than I could drive down to the local store.
Not all retired people are unhealthy and in constant need of a doctor. My guess is that your outdoor enthusiast friends are fairly healthy. Absolutely no one needs a Wal-Mart nearby....ever. How that ever became someone's standard gauge for judging an area's amenities is beyond my comprehension.
My wife and I are both in our late 80s, and we moved from big city life to a more rural town, 50 miles to a city of 100,000. We have a large independent grocery store/drug store, a hardware store, for our basic needs. There is a tire store, and an auto dealer in town that can take care of our vehicles, and a gas station. We buy non perishable groceries on line, and our other needs the same. A lot simpler than driving 50 miles each way in one direction, and 90 miles each way the other to go shopping.
The hospital is new, but more for basic care, and is a trauma center, and as part of the building there is a medical center with 4 doctors. It is 50 miles to the city for a great hospital which our local hospital,medical center is part of the medical system. The medical system has ambulances, and one of the few medical systems in the country, that owns its 2 air ambulance helicopters, plus 3 twin turbo air ambulance airplanes that allow this to be the major hospital system for northern half of Wyoming, The Western half of the Dakotas, Montana, and a Big Section of Southern Canada. It is good enough, it has been accepted as one of only 7 medical systems in the U.S. as an affiliate of the Mayo Clinic. Some specialists from the big hospital in the city such as my cardiologist , come here once or twice a month holding office hours. We have a teleconference room with a fantastic setup of test equipment, where a specialist in the city or May Clinic, can have a local technician administer tests with the patient hooked up here at the hospital, and the Specialist supervising everything including the instruments hooked up for the test are being read directly by the specialist when needed.
Our basic needs are being taken care of, our medical needs are taken care of, and we can do our shopping on line.
We have a housekeeper that comes in 3 days a week to care for our 3700 sq. ft. 4 level (not stories) home that has had 3 chair lifts installed so we don't have to climb chairs. If and when needed, she is always standing by if we need to be driven somewhere using our car. We have an acre landscaped out of our 5 acre property which is directly across the county road from best area of town, and our housekeepers teen age son care for it in the summer (one son has grown and left the area and the second son now has that job). Our tractor drops the mower in the winter, and our snow blade is attached to keep us plowed out when it snows and the yard boy does it. Her family has been with us for 5 years, and is more like a granddaughter than an employee. We pay her well, at $18 an hour, and we are her only one she works for.
I am telling about ourselves, to show that older people can live very well in rural areas, if they are careful and pick a rural area, where they can have what they need, or have easy access to. On Line Shopping, makes it even easier to live rural. Instead of having to go away to shop, I have not found anything we have needed including things like a part for the lawn mower, etc., we cannot get on line and usually at a better price. My wife's coffee maker just blew up, so a few minutes ago, I ordered her a new one to be here on Wednesday for about half of what I could buy one at the local hardware store. The stores are only 1 mile from our home, but I ordered on online in less time than I could drive down to the local store.
Thank you for sharing this. You are an inspiration.
Recognized 14 times as one of the top 100 hospitals in the entire US....and it is 26 miles ( a 40 minute drive ) from my house out in the sticks.
Not exactly 'teetering' !
I can see the need/want for having a decent hospital within easy driving distance but some people seem to think that if they live within a few blocks of a world class hospital, they are never going to die. People die everyday in world class hospitals, especially old people. You have a finite life span no matter how great the hospital is in your city. Also at some point, you have to ask yourself about quality of life, not just saving your life so you can live a couple more weeks or months hooked up to a machine.
I can see the need/want for having a decent hospital within easy driving distance but some people seem to think that if they live within a few blocks of a world class hospital, they are never going to die. People die everyday in world class hospitals, especially old people. You have a finite life span no matter how great the hospital is in your city. Also at some point, you have to ask yourself about quality of life, not just saving your life so you can live a couple more weeks or months hooked up to a machine.
Will you be driving yourself in your own car to the emergency room or hospital during and while you're having your heart attack, stroke, or other similar dire event in your rural location?
And no one said anything about "living within a few blocks from a world class hospital". Exaggeration does not help your argument.
By easy driving distance I was referring to an ambulance, not driving myself. Next time I'll be more specific. Also, yes, maybe not in this thread but I've seen some people talk in this forum about being a few blocks from a world class medical center as a priority in choosing where to live. I was not exaggerating.
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
34,700 posts, read 58,012,579 times
Reputation: 46172
Quote:
Originally Posted by matisse12
Will you be driving yourself in your own car to the emergency room or hospital during and while you're having your heart attack, stroke, or other similar dire event in your rural location?
And no one said anything about "living within a few blocks from a world class hospital". Exaggeration does not help your argument.
If driving ourselves...Hopefully we will be taking the tractor... (don't need a license to drive it home from hospital when released)
We have transported several of our neighbors to the hospital. But we are on decent terms with EMS (son works there, 7 min away) and have lifetime membership to medivac.
Highest wish is NO transport.. just toss me in the bucket of the backhoe, and drop me in the hole, backfill with the dozer and have the estate sale the next day - poof gone!
Living in USA without health insurance (pre-age 65) makes that wish quite possible / probable.
I'm curious why you use the term 'big city'. One does not need to live in a 'big city' to have amenities.
There are all types of medium-sized cities and towns, and college towns too.
And one can live in a medium-sized city or town where traffic is not as you describe.
We found that where we moved to, a town of 3500 on the edge of a university city of 35,000, works pretty well for us. Went in with my wife last week for her to get a bone density scan. The imaging center is about 10 minutes from our front door. We did have to slow down to take a good look at the buck and doe that were at the edge of the woods a couple of miles from our house. We have been over to the university (also about 10 minutes from our house) five times in the last two weeks for music programs. Kind of place where I stop by city hall once a month to drop off a check for our water/sewer bill and chat for a couple of minutes with the ladies there, but when my wife needed surgery on her back, didn't have to go any farther than the local hospital.
I am telling about ourselves, to show that older people can live very well in rural areas, if they are careful and pick a rural area, where they can have what they need, or have easy access to. On Line Shopping, makes it even easier to live rural. Instead of having to go away to shop, I have not found anything we have needed including things like a part for the lawn mower, etc., we cannot get on line and usually at a better price. My wife's coffee maker just blew up, so a few minutes ago, I ordered her a new one to be here on Wednesday for about half of what I could buy one at the local hardware store. The stores are only 1 mile from our home, but I ordered on online in less time than I could drive down to the local store.
I had to give up driving before moving to Oklahoma. I see beautifully, but the distance perception is way off, and that isn't a problem except driving, mostly knowing where the cars are exactly. I've gotten rides and my nephew used to give me rides, but its those when you need to go somewhere now moments which are more memorable. But I've found only a few things I can't order, and with two day shipping my biggest problem is the empty box collection. I don't need to figure out how to haul the stuff home from the store when it takes up quite a bit of space, and looks, from other passangers. And free delivery is part of most of the long list of stuff I get from Amazon.
It would be much harder to get normal shopping without deliver despite the time it takes to find it an 'discount' as they don't want you to find them.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
