As I read such stories, I become very troubled that a human being fighting for his or her life must spend so much time navigating the health care system. Instead of focusing on life, surviving and family a person with a terrible disease, and in this case, even an insider with good insurance must fight the system and potentially wake up questioning whether or not living should be the goal.
We are all programmed to fight and push to the end. Yet we now have a medical system that is so difficult to navigate that the push to survive a terrible illness often leads to bankruptcy or extreme financial hardship. Consequently, the emotional struggle behind a tough diagnosis and the immense effort required to survive must also include thoughts of whether or not it is worth fighting for an undetermined amount of time and potentially leaving surviving family members with an enormous debt load or letting the illness take its course as quickly and as cheaply as possible.
Those in charge of our convoluted system should be ashamed of themselves. Specifically, our elected officials and followed by the insurance companies and big pharma. We have a health care system where there are too many hands between the doctor and the patient taking their share of a limited pie and seemingly allowing the patients to fend for themselves at their most vulnerable and weakest point in life.
I don’t have the answer, but we need an answer. The problem is that some of those many hands that are pulling money and resources out of the system will need to give up something. Yet we are all, whether sick or healthy programmed not to give up anything.