Ok, rant time. I'm deviating a little from the March Madness, Spring Training, etc, today because this is making me loose my mind a little. A buddy of mine moved to New York. His girlfriend is doing graduate work, and he foolishly thought he could find journalism work there. I hope he does...he just hasn't yet. I'm not gonna use his name, unless he wants me to. But people who know him personally will know who he is.
This guy also happens to have type-1 diabetes. For those that aren't sure of the difference, type-1 is something that is detected in childhood, possibly even at birth, when the pancreas is basically non-functioning. The pancreas produces insulin to break down all the sugars you eat during the day. Without insulin, a person can become very depressed or overly energetic, if their blood-glucose levels are not regulated. If severely unregulated, it could put a person into shock, a coma, and you can obviously die from it. It's a very serious and complicated illness. My friend has to check himself regularly throughout the day, and during mealtimes, to keep tabs his levels. He then has to carefully regulate what he eats and drinks, so as to keep his blood sugar stabilized, or if it gets too high, inject himself with artificial insulin. Type-2, on the other hand, is developed later in life from poor eating habits consisting of far too many sugar-laden foods and drinks. These people have perfectly fine pancreases, but they've overwhelmed and over-worked them to the point that they shut down. However, unlike type-2, where some proper diet and exercise can bring back down your sugar levels and restore your pancreas to working order, type-1 is currently incurable. For the rest of his foreseeable life, my friend will have to prick himself, and inject insulin into his body about 4-6 times a day.
Now he probably wouldn't want me writing this, but then again, he's never been the type of guy to ask for anyone's help. When he tells people he has diabetes, they look at him funny and say "but you're not fat". He then has to go on to explain the things I just explained in the previous paragraph. He ran cross-country in high school. I'm sure he still exercises quite often. People who run competitively seem to continue to do it, even after they're no longer on a team. But here's there heart of my rant. He went to the doctor a few weeks ago. New city, new doctor. When he went in, he had to get his insurance checked out and all that goofy stuff. Well, they told him it had been accepted. Except they failed to mention, however, that it would not actually be accepted UNTIL he had a referral from a previous doctor. So when he found out later that he needed the referral, he contacted his doctor in Ohio, who was supposed to take care of that for him. He then assumed his insurance would cover the majority of his visit, as it always had. Without his previous doctor's referral, he could not prove that his diabetes was a pre-existing condition. And a NEW prescription for insulin shots isn't cheap.
So you can imagine his surprise when he received a bill from the New York doctor that had 4 numbers before the decimal place. Apparently they never got the referral that would ensure that his insurance would actually take care of most of his bill. I off-handedly suggested that if he were trying to get birth control instead of insulin, then someone important might care about his plight. We then went into a back and forth "what would Rush Limbaugh have to say about this" spoof. Seriously, not to take away from the birth control issue, because I believe its a very important thing-- and trust me, I would much rather help pay for your whatever-priced (I'm sorry I don't know the figures, don't go nuts on me ladies) birth control a month, than for your possible welfare baby for the next 18 years-- but this is a little bit more of a life-threatening issue.
But in the end, to a degree, the birth control issue and my friend's insulin/doctor problem is a part of the same issue. Why is the quality of life of one person more valuable than another? Why is it that I, a perfectly healthy white male, get some sort of preferred treatment when it comes to my bill than other people? Because I don't have any pre-existing conditions, I'm deemed as less of a risk to insure and treat, and therefore, don't cost them as much money. And the woman who is having a baby gets all the preferential treatment in the world, but the one who doesn't want to irresponsibly have one right now is a monster. And a guy whose had diabetes before he could walk is a risk and needs a referral from a previous doctor to prove, in fact, that he has had this disease all his life?
I get my insurance from my employer, and I'm grateful that they make it available to me. But it still freaks me out that without a phone call or a fax from someone you trust as deeply as a doctor doesn't come, that it becomes a big financial burden. And if your insurance company, if you have one, that you've been paying all that money to, doesn't come to help, all that burden would fall on you. And sometimes, that's too much weight for one person to hold up.
This guy also happens to have type-1 diabetes. For those that aren't sure of the difference, type-1 is something that is detected in childhood, possibly even at birth, when the pancreas is basically non-functioning. The pancreas produces insulin to break down all the sugars you eat during the day. Without insulin, a person can become very depressed or overly energetic, if their blood-glucose levels are not regulated. If severely unregulated, it could put a person into shock, a coma, and you can obviously die from it. It's a very serious and complicated illness. My friend has to check himself regularly throughout the day, and during mealtimes, to keep tabs his levels. He then has to carefully regulate what he eats and drinks, so as to keep his blood sugar stabilized, or if it gets too high, inject himself with artificial insulin. Type-2, on the other hand, is developed later in life from poor eating habits consisting of far too many sugar-laden foods and drinks. These people have perfectly fine pancreases, but they've overwhelmed and over-worked them to the point that they shut down. However, unlike type-2, where some proper diet and exercise can bring back down your sugar levels and restore your pancreas to working order, type-1 is currently incurable. For the rest of his foreseeable life, my friend will have to prick himself, and inject insulin into his body about 4-6 times a day.
Now he probably wouldn't want me writing this, but then again, he's never been the type of guy to ask for anyone's help. When he tells people he has diabetes, they look at him funny and say "but you're not fat". He then has to go on to explain the things I just explained in the previous paragraph. He ran cross-country in high school. I'm sure he still exercises quite often. People who run competitively seem to continue to do it, even after they're no longer on a team. But here's there heart of my rant. He went to the doctor a few weeks ago. New city, new doctor. When he went in, he had to get his insurance checked out and all that goofy stuff. Well, they told him it had been accepted. Except they failed to mention, however, that it would not actually be accepted UNTIL he had a referral from a previous doctor. So when he found out later that he needed the referral, he contacted his doctor in Ohio, who was supposed to take care of that for him. He then assumed his insurance would cover the majority of his visit, as it always had. Without his previous doctor's referral, he could not prove that his diabetes was a pre-existing condition. And a NEW prescription for insulin shots isn't cheap.
So you can imagine his surprise when he received a bill from the New York doctor that had 4 numbers before the decimal place. Apparently they never got the referral that would ensure that his insurance would actually take care of most of his bill. I off-handedly suggested that if he were trying to get birth control instead of insulin, then someone important might care about his plight. We then went into a back and forth "what would Rush Limbaugh have to say about this" spoof. Seriously, not to take away from the birth control issue, because I believe its a very important thing-- and trust me, I would much rather help pay for your whatever-priced (I'm sorry I don't know the figures, don't go nuts on me ladies) birth control a month, than for your possible welfare baby for the next 18 years-- but this is a little bit more of a life-threatening issue.
But in the end, to a degree, the birth control issue and my friend's insulin/doctor problem is a part of the same issue. Why is the quality of life of one person more valuable than another? Why is it that I, a perfectly healthy white male, get some sort of preferred treatment when it comes to my bill than other people? Because I don't have any pre-existing conditions, I'm deemed as less of a risk to insure and treat, and therefore, don't cost them as much money. And the woman who is having a baby gets all the preferential treatment in the world, but the one who doesn't want to irresponsibly have one right now is a monster. And a guy whose had diabetes before he could walk is a risk and needs a referral from a previous doctor to prove, in fact, that he has had this disease all his life?
I get my insurance from my employer, and I'm grateful that they make it available to me. But it still freaks me out that without a phone call or a fax from someone you trust as deeply as a doctor doesn't come, that it becomes a big financial burden. And if your insurance company, if you have one, that you've been paying all that money to, doesn't come to help, all that burden would fall on you. And sometimes, that's too much weight for one person to hold up.
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