Military medicine

I know that everyone's up in arms (and losing fingers) debating the health care reform that may or may not take place. I have only one thought for you to chew on-if 50 million people are thrown into the system with free health care, don't they realize that there are not enough health care providers to provide quality care in a timely manner? Not that I'm saying, it shouldn't be provided, but I believe baby steps need to be taken in order to ensure everyone has proper care. We do not want to end up like Cananda. Many Canadians come to the US for health care because they may have to wait three years to have a heart bypass. My friend's mother in law was refused kidney dialysis because she did not follow her diabetic medicine and diet properly and they only had one machine-better to let the people use it who cared about their health.

Enough of that. Anyway, we live in this system. Military medicine is not all its cracked up to be. Yes, it free. BUT, we have no say in our care whatsoever. I could tell you about a dozen horror stories-all either happened to me or my friends. These are not stories passed down from person to person. My favorite, is when Bugabug tried to climb the side of her cribe when she was about 18 months old. Got her leg stuck and fell. Couldn't put pressure on it and cried. The doctor refused to do xrays because he said that she had a viral infection in her hip and that her sister lied about what happened (I was folding laundry in another room). His super duper xray eyes helped him with his diagnosis. I'm surprised I didn't slug him. Anyway, it was fractured, thankfully, only a splinter fracture, but it took me four days to get the correct diagnosis. nice.

Yesterday, I had to take the baby for her two week checkup. I arrived at 9:10 for my 9:20 appt. I was brought in for vitals at 9:25 and then placed into the exam room. Before I go on, I should tell you that yesterday was Kevin's first day back to work after baby leave. He opted to come home after pt and watch the kids so I didn't have to take five kids with me to the doctor. Okay, back to the story. At 9:55, still no doctor, nor any contact with anyone. I went out to ask the status of the doctor. The corpsmen didn't know. He was with a patient I was told, that's all he knew. Okay, was I patient twelve and he was on number ten? What was the deal? At 10:15 I dressed the baby and put her in her car seat. At 10:20 I walked out. I handed my paperwork to the nurse and told her I couldn't wait any longer, my hubby had to get to work. Her response was "do you need to reschedule?". Well, no not really. See I was here. For over an hour. And waiting. And waiting. Without any communication with the staff. I was done.

I do have to say, that they did at least call me to apologize yesterday. I was told that there was an emergency that morning that needed to be addressed. Okay, that's totally fine. I'm certainly not going to say, hey, ignore the kid not breathing, cause I have an appt today. I'm not that cold hearted. My point was, that during this hour, that could have been told to me. Wasn't. They don't care. This is just their job in the military and they're passing their time until they get out. Its very frustrating to be in a system of health care providers that are overworked adn underpaid, and more often than not, understaffed. Praying for our country and health care reform!

Sorry for the rant.