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Saving Medicare: Taking Control of one's Health
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So Medicare is beginning to curve a bigger pie in national debate nowadays. It is getting so contentious that politicians lose votes depending on their position related to it. The real problem, as we all know, is not only Medicare. It is the whole health care system.
I have been in health care business for more than 20 years. I’ve witnessed its peak and now its lowest point. And because I have been part of it, I often wonder how it fell under. Who are the culprits?
Any health care plan is designed to insure that its subscriber receives medical/health care if s/he gets sick. Like any other insurance, with contributions and premiums, it is meant to provide comfort and peace of mind. But with Medicare, something wrong happened along the way. First, the cost of care became exorbitant largely due to high degree of technological advancements, Research and Development, expensive litigation and lawyers catering to lawsuit-driven consumers - these are just a few of the contributing factors to its high cost. As one Doctor puts it, what will happen if lawyers and Doctors and politicians and all other health care practitioners see trillions of dollars available out there? Of course they will spend it.
And it is very easy to blame doctors and lawyers and chief executives and politicians for all the health care woes but as I delve deeper into this, I also see the patient or consumer a part of the problem. Through the years, an increasing amount of people live with total disregard to good health because they have a false self-assurance that their health benefits will ‘take care of everything’ if they got sick. That is a dangerous belief. We have arrived at a point where who owns and guides our health is not ourselves anymore but some outsider. We have lost our control because drugs and surgery and therapy took the helm of our lives.
We have given up our ‘Self‘ as the main judge, juror and executioner of our health. We have lost control over our lives. The fact that ? of the US is obese is a sign that most of us have stopped owning our lives and allowed junk food, over-indulgence, inactivity, doctors, prophets of easy-fix, imbalanced lifestyle dictate us. Even now, we seem to think that the resolution of our health care crisis rely heavily on Washington.
Imagine this, if all Americans will try owning their health, if they, from now on will live healthy lives barring accidents and genetic predispositions, we will not even be talking about health care crisis in our future. To me, health insurance is only needed when absolutely needed. I will probably get so angry with myself if I suffer from a health condition because of my own negligence, over-indulgence, lack of discipline or lack of knowledge. To own our health, we must first learn what it takes to have good health. The next step is to have enough determination to achieve or maintain the best health possible within our means. The third step is to get habituated to the notion that there is nobody out there who will determine the course of our lives, especially our health except ourselves.
From wikipedia:
...As an example of the problem, according to theAssociated Press, the average wage couple jointly earned $89,000 annually in 2010. Upon attaining eligibility for Medicare and retirement in 2011, they would have paid in $114,000 in Medicare payroll taxes total. But their expected average medical services, including prescriptions are expected to cost $355,000, about three times what they paid in. When the last of the Baby Boomers retire in about 2030, 80 million people will be expecting coverage; the ratio of tax payers supporting the system is expected to drop from today’s 3.5 for each person, to 2.3.[75]...
...The fundamental problem is that the ratio of workers paying Medicare taxes to retired people drawing benefits is shrinking, and at the same time, the price of health care services per person is increasing.[57][58] Currently there are 3.9 workers paying taxes into Medicare for every older American receiving services. By 2030, as the baby boom generation retires, that is projected to drop to 2.4 workers for each beneficiary. Medicare spending is expected to grow by about 7 percent per year for the next 10 years.[59] As a result, the financing of the program is out of actuarial balance, presenting serious challenges in both the short-term and long-term.[48][51]...
On Pain and Pill Mills
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So I have been busy lately with exams in midterms. It's been a while since I made an update. I may not be as 'regular' in updates as I wish I could but I still update this site with the latest news on health whenever I can. And I can talk a lot if given the opportunity. I am taking 6 credit hours towards an IT degree and still working more than full time as PT. The one thing I am regretting is 'my lost week' last week in terms of exercises due to mid terms. I should be able to resume work-outs as soon as I can.
There is a whirlwind of events that transpired in South Florida since my last post. First, there was a clamp down on 'pain mills' that multiplied in this area like ant colonies in the pat couple of years inviting crooks who sell them and addicts who procure them. Pain meds have been abused a lot in this part of the world. It poses a great challenge to me as a health care worker to address this epidemic.
I have a friend who, if not for my prodding to avoid pain by non-narcotic options would have become a casualty now of these pain mills. I was suspicious initially, thinking that he could just be using pain to get access to meds until he told me he was ready to 'end it all' if he kept on dealing with horrible pain for the rest of his life. All the other conservative approaches: multiple PTs, cortisone shots, did not stop him from taking pills month after month and the amount was increasing. Tha'ts when I suggested surgery. I just did not feel that a person should become dependent on pain pills in life. Pain pills are friends for a moment but they can kill if they stay for the rest of your life.
Anyway, after surgeries and recent rhizotomies, he is now back to swimming and though his work can sometimes trigger the pain, resting usually relieves it. But the search for a lasting non-narcotic solution is ongoing.
The trouble with pain is - it is a symptom that we try to get rid of - as a symptom. We fail to address its source, its roots, its cause. For every pain there is a cause. And that cause is injury to the body. It could be a muscle tissue, ligament, bone, disk, organ, any part of the body. As long as the source is neglected and ignored, it will linger.
The most common pains are easy to manage. Tooth aches, headaches(some), stomach aches, post-surgery pains, sports injury pain are pretty much manageable. Pain meds are sometimes necessary in this case, albeit temporarily for one to live a normal life. These are called acute pains. Then there are other pains that linger forever and are the main culprit when we talk of pain-med dependencies. We talk of chronic back and neck pains that can last anywhere from six months to forever. These are the ones difficult to treat and the ones that will most likely lead a person into some form of pain med dependency or addiction.
The question is - why does the back cause so much misery to some people when it hurts?
There is something I call antenna principle.
Most of us are born without back pains. When you see an infant, back pain is probably the last thing he would cry about. Something, in our growing up years, happens to our bodies. First, at twenty five, our bones would have reached their full maturity. At age 30, our physical decline begins. Also at this age, we go to college, go to work and burden ourselves with lots of responsibilities.
In college, we sit longer to study or listen to lectures. At work, we mostly sit down especially in jobs associated with desks and and remain immobile for long periods of time. These activities only lead to a few problems. Our erect bodies are like the old antennas attached to out roofs. First we erect the spine of the antenna and then support it with wire strings until it stays straight.
Imagine the antenna as the spine and the supporting wires as muscles. Those muscles do a good job as long as these are well-connected and are equal in tone (tautness) and obviously not broken.
Lets say something happens such as an accident and one muscle get injured. Most likely the the upright antenna will lean to one side. To prevent collapse, the other muscles will tighten up.
Leaning leads to postural deformity. The unequal tightening of muscles lead to core muscle imbalances. If we'd look at the details of this, the spine which is made of different vertebras interconnected by disks, ligaments and muscles will be placed in an over compensation mode.
There begins man's problem of back pain. What causes back pain? It's postural mal-alignment, muscles imbalances and overall weakness. Once we correct this 'leaning antenna', the pain will get resolved.
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