It’s been a while since I have blogged in earnest. Since my return from Los Angeles I have been focused on one thing – helping my parents. It’s interesting how in a split second our lives can be turned upside down. Everything that seemed so significant and necessary before LA, has taken a back seat to dealing with our family crisis. Gratefully, things have taken a turn for the better and I am now able to take a deep breath and reflect.

One of the most important lessons I learned through this experience is how important it is to stay healthy. Of course I have always known the obvious reasons for this, but I have discovered another reason: the need to avoid dealing with the medical industry. I am still reeling from the level of callousness and disregard for human dignity that I have witnessed over the past three week. Whether I was dealing with hospital staff or private doctors (and we have had to see many different doctors for different conditions) for the most part we have been treated like cattle. My father was discharged too soon with absolutely no regard for his health. The family was not instructed as to what to expect and how to deal with it. The discharge planning was poor and unsupportive. We have been lied to, manipulated, dismissed, ignored, neglected, left waiting in doctor’s offices for hours, and overall treated without care. There were a couple of exceptions which included support staff at the imaging facility and one doctor at Mount Sinai. As I called on several friends who are in the field to seek advice and help, I got a clear message that this is the horrors they have to deal with daily.

Because of my social work background, I was able to negotiate most of this madness and help my father get all the help he needed. But there are millions of people who do not have the knowledge and access that I do. What happens to them and their family members? There is no question in my mind that many people are seriously hurt and/or die because of this dysfunctional medical system. It is truly mind boggling to think that in United States of America – the richest nation in the world – we cannot access excellent and humane healthcare. The problem is that until people in the country stand up and assert that access to excellent healthcare is a right and not a privilege, and until people recognize that medicine cannot be a for-profit business, this situation is bound to only get worse.

I know this is not my typical tone. I am usually very positive and inspiring. After what I have seen and learned first hand about our health care system, I am finding it difficult to think of what we can do to change this greed-filled system. With the baby boomers growing older and potentially sicker every day, we need to find a way to build a caring and strong healthcare system.

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