Utterly worthless doctors

[Metamorphik]

Every doctor I see does the same thing: Tell me to see a specialist. Knowing full well that I’m not rich, and that it’s next to impossible to get insurance in this backwoods hell on earth I was born into and trapped in. Knowing full well that I might have fibromalgia or maybe even something as serious as myelopathy. Knowing full well that it’s one hundred percent impossible for anyone to get disability around here if they actually need it. Treating me with smugness at best, and aggressive scolding at worst. Well, they are allowed to refer me to a charity based program. An organization who tell me themselves that they can arrange for me to see a neurologist as long as a primary care provider says they can… and of course the providers fight it tooth and nail and I have to keep switching to other ones, trying to get them to put the referral through. Total wastes of flesh. Yeah… nothing against good doctors. It’s the millions of horrible ones who give a bad name to the other five or six on the planet.

 

[emily21]

I hate to say it, (but I'm going to say it anyway), the health system utterly sucks

If you are not immediately in danger, or not in need of immediate support, you get put on the waiting list- or told to see someone else

and so it goes... until maybe one day someone will give you an answer

 

[sunkacola]

@Metamorphik , this stinks so badly. I am sorry you are going through this, and you have my full empathy and understanding. I have been there, done that, felt the anger and frustration. I don't know where you are but if you are in the US this is typical. Healthcare in this country is run purely for profit, and that is about as wrong as it can be. Only the well off get decent health care.
I am originally from a country with national health care, and that is the only sane and humane way for it to be: health care equally available to everyone regardless of economic status. I wish it were that way everywhere. It's completely insane to have it any other way.

 

[Metamorphik]

Thank you. Sorry to all who deal with this. And yes, the USA. HELL ON EARTH. “Your condition might be treatable as long as you get help immediately”, I’m told time and time again. Well, immediately would’ve been a month ago. I’m going to be complete incapacitated by the time anybody helps me.

 

[sunkacola]

@Metamorphik , you won't be "completely incapacitated". I get what you are saying, and it comes from frustration, and I fully empathize with that. But keep in mind that there is great power in the human brain and if you tell yourself that you are going to be incapacitated or that other terrible things are in store for you, you can actually create a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Just sayin'.
You were probably saying that for effect rather than really meaning it literally, but I just wanted to say that just in case you meant it.

While the USA is actually not even in the running for the title of hell on earth if you compare what your life would be in a refugee camp, for instance, or in Gaza currently, or any number of other places where health care doesn't even exist and you stand a good chance of being shot on your way to the outhouse or being bombed in your sleep, it is shameful in many ways how the government operates here, especially with regard to health care. Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Canada, have far better standards of living for their citizens. Unfortunately, they are all cold so I don't want to live there.

 

[MissNeverWell]

Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Canada, have far better standards of living for their citizens.

Healthcare has really deteriorated in Canada as well. There is such a shortage of general/family practitioners that after many months on the wait list, a prospective doctor taking new patients arranges a "meet and greet" to see if you are a "good fit". No addressing of medical concerns at that time, even if there is a symptom you want to have checked out. This protocol also makes it very difficult for you to switch doctors if it doesn't work out. There really is no choice because of the scarcity of doctors, they just make it look like there is.

 

[sunkacola]

I am sorry to hear that. It is much the same in the US, @MissNeverWell, in terms of seeing specialists.
And of course, in the US if you don't have money or insurance there is no health care available at all, period. some doctors and clinics won't see a patient unless they have insurance, even if they offer to pay cash for the treatment; others won't take insurance of any kind, and so on. Of ll of the well developed and wealthy countries in the world, I think the US is the worst for healthcare (although I have not stats to back that up). At least in Canada, a person does get to see a doctor even if they are poor.

 

[MissNeverWell]

I am sorry to hear that. It is much the same in the US, @MissNeverWell, in terms of seeing specialists.
And of course, in the US if you don't have money or insurance there is no health care available at all, period. some doctors and clinics won't see a patient unless they have insurance, even if they offer to pay cash for the treatment; others won't take insurance of any kind, and so on. Of ll of the well developed and wealthy countries in the world, I think the US is the worst for healthcare (although I have not stats to back that up). At least in Canada, a person does get to see a doctor even if they are poor.

Excellent point, yes, US medical care is mercenary. Sheer greed. You are right, despite the lack of uniform access/quality of care in Canada, you can see a doctor that is government funded; in Ontario it's called OHIP. However, now what the family doctors are doing is requesting you pay into a yearly plan for a fee to cover things such as phone consultations/prescriptions, doctor's notes, missed appointments and such "not covered under OHIP". Mom and I never bothered because we didn't miss appointments, didn't have phone in consultations/prescriptions and certainly didn't need school or employer's sick notes, lol. However, some doctors really push it.

 

[BlueBells]

@Metamorphik @MissNeverWell @sunkacola @emily21

Reading the above, I'm thinking the Aussie system, though in trouble at the moment, is not really that bad.

It is getting hard to keep doctors anywhere outside of the bigger cities, but we can make an appointment and get to see a doctor within a few days, if not the same day. Not sure how it goes in more remote areas, but rural Victoria is okay.