S O U N D   O F F

Dear Roni
Yes you may post this story. However please read what additional information that I have included. I was in a hurry when I wrote that little snippet to you and others as I had just returned from the doctor’s office and I was still deeply upset about the Supreme Courts decision that they had made the day before.

So there is hope after all?
Today I had to go to my regular doctor for a check up and get my prescriptions filled. Mark dropped me off and went to the hardware store. It was 10:00 AM and there were only 2 other people in the waiting room. My doctor is one of the few doctors in our neighbor that still take Medicaid. When I was called into the other room I had left my back pillow on the chair as I had both hands filled with my purse and other back pillow.

After seeing my doctor while gathering up my things I realized that I had forgotten my back pillow, I rushed back into the waiting room and discovered that the room was filled people, every chair was full. There were even people standing up waiting to see the receptionist. I had to duck and dive, twist and turn to get through the mob of people standing around waiting their turn.

  While I was seeing the doctor my son had returned from his trip to the hardware store and upon discovering that I had left my back pillow, he retrieved it. When I saw that my son had found it and I was greatly relieved.

While we were walking out towards the door, a man next to the door was smiling and laughing at me so I asked him why was he laughing? He replied that I reminded him of his wife as she was always forgetting important things that she can’t live without. I looked at the wife and told her that it was good that we have other people in out life to keep us from falling apart.

After getting into the Blazer, Mark said that I arrived just in time and my arrival back into the waiting room, just about broke up a riot that was just about to erupt. What ever for I asked him? A riot in the waiting room of the doctor’s office I asked him as I had never heard of that happening before.

 “Ah yes” he said. On the wall was one of the most important pieces of equipment in all waiting rooms, the large TV screen with CNN spouting its propaganda.

The woman announcer was telling its viewers all 55,000 of them as that was CNN latest poll numbers that this new health care bill was going to be so wonderful and good and help so many people. With that announcement most everyone in the waiting room starting laughing, only it was not a laugh that one makes when they are happy. OH Yes, yelled another man, “Tell that to the Canadians how grand their health system is.” We will now have to get used to waiting and waiting and waiting. His uncle lived in Canada and when he needed treatment for his cancer, he had to wait until they decided what they were going to do about it. While they were thinking about what to do about his cancer his uncle died waiting for them to decide what to do about it.

Mark said, “Yea, my mother lived in the UK for 14 years and she had to wait for 18 months before they would remove the cataract on her right eye. And the only reason they finally removed the cataract was that she was developing a cataract on her left eye. After all you only need on eye, so there was no need to have the cataract removed. You have to wait until your surgery is granted approval, and that is what is going to happen to us. We will have to wait until the 15 member panel will approve of your treatment.

Other people in the waiting room starting saying how upset they were about the Supreme Court decision to say that Obama Care was constitutional and it would go ahead. Most of the people grumbled that the government should not be telling us how or what doctors we see ECT. There were two people in the waiting room that thought that is was good ruling and they were happy with it. And that is how the riot almost started, between most of them that were for it and 2 brain washed idiot’s that didn’t now any better.

So maybe there is hope after all. There were about 20 people in the waiting room and it was now 11:00 AM who don’t want the government to tell them what to do and how to do it and they were pissed. And there were only 2 doctors, so that will tell you what we will be in for, long waiting periods.

And that was how my visit to my doctor’s office went today. Since you had asked me if you could post this little snippet of my first experience at the doctor’s office after the Supreme Court in its infinite wisdom made its decision on whether The Patient Affordability Act was constitutional or not I must add some details on having the cataract the on my right eye removed under the National Health Service in the UK.

It is correct that you have infinite patience in being a patient in the “free health service” that National Health Service provides. First I had to wait until my cataract was ripe enough to be removed. When I started to have triple vision in my right eye, due to the thickness of the cataract, it was deemed ripe enough to be removed. It was then that I was put on a waiting list to have the cataract operation. At that time I had to close my right eye when ever I tried to do anything with precision as turning the gas up or down under the pans on gas stove while cooking.  When I was building the fences or trellises for my garden, I would see 3 nails, one nail in the middle; the other two nails bent at a 45 degree angle. So I would hit the middle nail and hope that I got the right one and would miss the fingers on my hand as I tried to hold the nail up. When trying to climb stairs it was equally difficult as I was forever tripping over them as I could not judge exactly where the step was.

  Finally after having to wait for 18 months for my name to come up to the top of the list to have the cataract operation I received notification that I was to the operation on a certain day. Having to wait 18 months was not all that unusual. All surgeries are scheduled for the same time, early in the morning. After arriving at the hospital on the appointed day you sit and wait once again and for your name to be called. And that could take ALL DAY!

I was put into a room and on a trolley where they inserted a needle directly into the eye to deaden the pain. An IV drip was inserted into my vein on my left hand. And once again I waited until it was my turn to be wheeled into the actual surgery room. When the doctor started to removed the cataract, I screamed because I had waited so long on the trolley that the shot they had given me in the eye ball to deaden the pain, had started to wear off, and I could feel everything. Upon realizing this, the doctor screamed at the nurse to give me something else where upon the nurse said “we are all out of that.” So the doctor screamed another name of a drug to her and she again replied that they were also out of that drug. The doctor then said another name and they fortunately still had some of that stuff so it was inserted into the IV drip.

I could still feel the pain but it was not as acute, but I moaned all through the operation concentrating on my moaning, as you can only have one thought in your mind at a time, and I choose to concentrate on my voice rather than my eye and the sound of the equipment that was being used to remove the cataract. I was never so glad to have something over with before in my life as I was at that time.

When I went to see another doctor for my eye check up later on I told the doctor about my experiences in the operating room. He was a young doctor and he just chuckled, and shook his head, and said that is par for the course for the NHS. It is an accepted norm.

This is the attitude of the people in the NHS. They are a lot of good doctors, nurses and hospitals, but you do not have a choice. You take the doctor that they assign to you in the area that you life. If you want to change doctors, you move to different area. If you choose to go to a private doctor or hospital for treatment for a particular problem than you can not go back to the NHS for treatment and you are stuck between the rock and the hard space.

This is what happens when you let a 15 member panel decide what is best for you. You can go to the web site below see a list for other stories on how socialized medicine works. I can describe it in two words “It doesn’t!”

You can decide what news stories you want to post Roni, I just want you to know what we are in for if we do not get this Obama care repealed.

Wishing you the best and let me know what else I can do to help you spread the word. Colleen