The Healthcare Crisis Gets Personal

Joy and I woke up Thursday morning at 5:00 a.m. to the sounds of our screaming four-year-old, Jack, who was suffering from extreme abdominal pain. We tried to console and cuddle him, but to no avail. "Don't touch me, it really hurts!" he cried, when we tried to examine or gently rub his sore tummy. This was not like him at all; he is not an overreactive kid. We had to go get him at school that day because he was vomiting and had diarrhea. He had a quiet afternoon at home and went to sleep easily, but now was literally wailing and inconsolable.

It's every parent's greatest fear - a sick child, maybe very sick, and in the middle of the night. How serious might it be? Could it be appendicitis - or something equally bad? This wasn't like Jack. Then nine-year-old Luke, who had been awakened by Jack's crying, was in our room too - tired, scared, and also crying. What should we do? I called our health provider and got a nurse advisor. After I described Jack's symptoms and distress, she said, "Take him to the emergency room at Children's Hospital." So we threw clothes on and rushed out to the garage. There was snow on the ground and ice on the steps as I carried my screaming and scared little boy. "Why didn't I put on boots with a grip?" I asked myself, as I carefully but hurriedly climbed down the treacherous steps with Jack in my arms.

We got in the car and headed into the deserted Washington, D.C. streets on our way to an emergency room we hoped and prayed was not too busy. Joy drove with Luke, who was asking all kinds of worried questions, while I tried to calm Jack (and myself) in the back seat by praying out loud that God would keep him safe. Luke joined in the prayers. We arrived at the ER, and I rushed in with Jack while Joy and Luke went to park the car.

It's the moment of panicked parenthood, rushing into the emergency room with your suffering and frightened child, almost frantically surveying the room for where you should go. "He's got severe abdominal pains; we need to see a doctor now!" I almost shout to the first person I encounter. I am in no mood to fill out papers and forms and talk about insurance coverage as I slap Jack's insurance card on the reception desk.

Fortunately, we are quickly accepted and admitted. They are all very attentive, compassionate, and professional. From the intake personnel, to the nurses, to the doctors (we were lucky enough to get the head of the ER who was on his shift just then), everybody was clearly competent and concerned. Joy and Luke rushed in soon after we did and we were all taken to a clean and quiet room where Jack was quickly and comprehensively examined. They spoke reassuringly as they looked at our little boy, telling us what they were going to do and what the possibilities were. Right away they got an IV to hydrate him and administer some pain-reducing medicine that was gentle for children. He got quieter and seemed to relax.

I saw a hospital system focus on a little boy with time, energy, concern, and (I assume) lots of financial resources. They did several X-rays of his stomach, chest, and lungs, and even did a comprehensive ultrasound to look for any sign of an inflamed appendix. The medicine was working its wonders and Jack was getting sleepy. But I had to wake him up, sit, and stand him up for the X-rays. My little trooper was a star as he stood still the best he could, even after such a traumatic morning, waiting for the technician to "take a picture of your tummy," as I told him. He looked up at me with such vulnerable and trusting eyes and said, "Even if my tummy can't smile." Afterward, I knew he was becoming himself again when he began to make several observations about the environment around him and philosophized, "When you're sad, and they turn you upside down, it turns into a smile." Yes, I said, amazed at how perspective does indeed change everything.

Joy was running Luke to school now, as Jack and I moved around the hospital for all the tests, in what we began to call his "traveling bed," which he thought was quite cool. Jack's big brother Luke was really worried and kept pressing his mom on whether Jack was okay and "wasn't going to die, right?" She assured him that his little brother was in very good hands now and would be alright. "Without Jack, life would be nothing," Luke tearfully lamented. "The first four years of my life were really boring!" he exclaimed to his moved and bemused mother.

She was back now in the hospital after dropping Luke off at school. Jack was resting comfortably back in our safe little room in the ER, and the doctor came in to tell us the results of all the testing, X-rays, and diagnosis. "Your son has pneumonia," he said, shocking us both. A nagging cough had settled into his left lung and was making him vomit while putting very painful pressure on his diaphragm and abdomen. But they were going to start administering the antibiotic right then and there, and, with a couple days of rest and quiet, he would start to get better. And there was no sign of appendicitis.

Several hours after our frightful awakening, we got Jack home and I got the antibiotic that was so critical to his healing at our health care provider's pharmacy. It was $10. And all the other care my son had received that morning was already paid for by our insurance. Jack was home, comfortable, and safe; while his mom and dad were greatly relieved. After Luke borrowed his fourth grade teacher's cell phone to call home to see how Jack was, he was finally relieved too.

But I began to think how different this all would have been if we were a family who didn't have health insurance and therefore hesitated or were afraid to go to the emergency room. Or, if we were "undocumented" and were terrified to take our child to a hospital. Or, if we were parents in Uganda living hundreds of miles from a doctor and just had to listen to our screaming child and hope that he wouldn't die.

My policy views on health care reform are very public. But this morning made it all very personal. Every parent, no matter who they are and where they live, can easily have the kind of trauma over the health of a child that we had. And every parent should have the medical care that we got. It's just wrong if they don't. What I realized most was how important it is for those who have that care to fight for those who don't. Other parents love their children just as fiercely as we love Jack, pray just as fervently for their healing, and have the right - as absolutely equally important children of God - to good and affordable health care. God loves all the children as much as God loves Jack, and its time to build a health care system in this country that respects that fundamental moral affirmation.

Jim Wallis is the Editor-in-Chief of Sojourners and blogs at www.godspolitics.com.

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Comments

[YankeeCanuck]

THis article brings it home. It asks us to think how we would feel if we were uninsured and needed critical care for a child.

Here is an item no blog has picked up yet, except James Kunstler's.It's outrageous.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a_.lq.5HsMvc&refer=home

I mentioned below this item as it appeared in the Wall Street Journal. The insurers are clearly a part of the problem. A BIG part. Follow the money.

[TXfemmom]

I am a health care professional. There are so many ways in which great economies could be made in the system, and those economies could and should be directed toward health care.

Remember duplication of all those HUGE BUREAUCRASIES within insurance companies, so they can micromanage the care COSTS BILLIONS AND BILLIONS. Were they all just go to one form, it would save tons of money.

If they would just go to three different plans, and all insurers would have to provide the same services in those plans, the system could be saved billions.

I have had a lot of experience and contact with the French system, which is the best system in the world, and they view it as a basic human right for all, all employers and employees must pay into it or purchase a private policy, and their expenses for a Bentley system, is much less than our old, oil-belching Chevrolet one. Oh, and the self-employed must pay as well.

[Dantheman99]

The sad thing is neither of two leading Democrats proposes single-payer health care. Obama's plan is laughable and weak. Hillary's will result in billions made by private insurance companies.

Even if a Democrat is elected President and were to propose Universal Health Care, who knows what a corporate bought and paid for Democratic Party and a corporate bought and paid for Republican Party would actually allow to pass.

Whatever pressure goes onto the candidates for President, Congress, Governor, State Legislator, etc, that pressure is going to continue long past election day because the Health Care Insurance industry lobbyists never sleep and they'll be ready to try and sabotage any plan or bill that reduces their profits and Executive pay be even one cent.

[nomoredead]

Families being ruined.
Companies going bankrupt.
Companies moving overseas.
People actually dying.
While these companies make billions.
This has got to stop.

[TheWesternBreed]

The monthly premium we will pay our non-profit HMO in 2008 (as individual policyholders, we pay the full freight)was just announced: it represents a 24% increase over last year, for everyone in our geographical region. A year ago, there was the same kind of increase. Just like before, the only explanation was a one-liner about "rising medical costs in our area." Our options are simple: less coverage or quit and try to get on board with some other plan--which would run into the old "preexisting conditions" roadblock.

No, we can't raise the prices we charge our own clients by 24% on January 1.

When I add up our premiums, we could scarcely pay more under a one-payer national health care plan, and for about the same level of care. (We already wait weeks to see a specialist or months for an surgical procedure, just like the allegedly nightmare situation in England or Canada.)

At a certain point the health-care industry in the USA will become so ridiculously costly for so many people that a tipping point will be reached, and there will be a day of reckoning for the private insurers and some serious, serious reform. Sadly, that day hasn't yet arrived--and so our HMO will get a few thousand more bucks from us that some other business won't have a chance at.

[ZanIts1984]

My brother and I are one of those many individuals without health insurance. Both my brother and I were laid off of our jobs and are now struggling to get by. Not to mention my brother and I are in are 20's trying to actually make something of ourselves. My brother was laid off because he was continuously becoming sick but could not go to the hospital because we have no money or health insurance. The last thing we needed was for one of us to end up in the hospital but it happend.

Over the Thanksgiving holidays my brother became violently ill throwing up blood and having extreme abdominal cramps. He was kept in the hospital for three days including Thanksgiving. He ended up being diagnosed with Crohns Disease. His hospital bill has ended up being over $15,000 plus his pills he NEEDS to take for some semblance of a normal life cost $350 per bottle a month. We can't afford this and we can't get him any health insurance that is even closely affordable.

We paid our taxes, we never have asked anyone for help but the one time we need help there is nobody. What are people suppose to do? Drop down and die? Go through painful surgeries that will end up costing hospitals more money in then trying to save a life? A life and illness that could be treated but can't because hospital and pharmaceutical companies wanted a fat wallet?!

This system is messed up and I don't see any help coming anytime soon. You and your family are lucky. The majority of us are not.

[drricklippin]

thanks Jim

Glad your son is ok. Often it DOES take a personal experience to awaken/enlighten us?

Thanks for your awakening and leadership.

Be Well,

Dr. Rick Lippin
http://mediclcrises.blogspot.com

[JusticiaParaTodos]

As a medical social worker I see with my eyes what the healthcare system is about in our nation! The patients with "good" coverage are separated from those with no so good and of course those without are just without.

This is why I actively work for the passage of House Resolution 676! This is why I will cast my vote for Dennis Kucinich in the Texas primary! This is why when Bush and his ilk speak about suporting human rights, I come right back on them with; so where is our single payer universal healthcare? So why does labor have the disadvantage in organizing new members?

As to Jesus, etc. I truly believe that he would not be accepted by those who claim to be christians with their six and seven figure incomes! Jesus in many ways was a revolutionary, and that is why the Roman and Jewish establishment hated him so.

[YankeeCanuck]

I read an article in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday. It was about the former CEO of United Health Care agreeing to settle out of court and return $620 MILLION of back-dated stock options he had ( allegedly, illegally) obtained from the company as a reward.
BUT he was left with salary (from 1996 til his resignation) and other stock options that totalled more than TWICE that amount.

I don't understand why this is not a cause of OUTRAGE when 48 million Americans, mainly the poor and children, are uninsured.
AND while the insurance companies pick and choose whom they will insure, taking no risk.
AND while they parcel out health care, adding several layers of bureaucracy into the process. They employ doctors with whom our our own Drs must negotiate for our care.

Employers hire based in health risk, number and health of family members. Employers also lay off based on these factors. Then were are these families? At the ER one day without coverage.

Now, that's sick.

[MamaBird62]

Jim,
Thanks for telling this story. I hope that your son recovers quickly and fully.
Best wishes for a joyful season,
MamaBird

[Citizenofreality]

In a country which proclaims to have the "best health care system in the world" medical treatment should be a right not a privilege. I'm glad your little boy will be fine, but it is sad that for many people a visit such as the one you experienced would result in being indebted for thousands of dollars.

[swift goat pet for truth]

We should all have the same medical plan that US Congressmen have. Period.

Anything to do with healthcare should be strictly not for profit. No "Least care for the cheapest price".

[fairwitness]

Quite so, sir; we just had a similiar incident. Even with basic medical insurance, a broken leg as a result of a random trip and fall on stairs, will cost many thousands; the total bill, though, without insurance, is approaching $40,000! Without insurance, we'd be ruined financially by a simple freak slip on the stairs!

This country is shameful for so long preventing health care for all--it's a moral disgrace that simply must be recitified by the next president and their party. How can we think of ourselves as a nation of decent human beings while such an obvious and desperate need goes unfulfilled because corporations have gained complete power over the social mileau and always take profit over human values? I say we can't.

[hopeless277]

If 'God' had wanted every child to have health care, he wouldn't be a Republican.

[JoeAlferio]

I know that I sound like a commie every time I tell this story, but, in a previous life, I was a union office in the Utility Workers Union here in Michigan. I attended a union conference on electric utility deregulation years ago at which Richard Trumka, the AFL-CIO Treasurer and former fireball president of the United Mine Workers spoke.

It was a typical rouse the rabble speech, but one passage sticks in my mind.

Trumka said, "Somewhere tonight, in America, a little child will have a bad dream and cry out for Mom and Dad. And that mother and father will go to the childs room and flip the light switch and then go to the bathroom to get a glass of water for the child."

"And, you know what? When that switch gets flipped, the lights ought to come on. And when the tap is opened, clean, cold water should come out. And someone should guarantee it!"

Same with health care. Your 4 year old gets sick, someone should help you take care of them, and someone should guarantee it.

If that makes me a socialist, then all I have to say is, "Where do I sign up?"

Joe Alferio