I have been in six different emergency rooms. Three were in predominantly rural areas. Two were in suburban-urban areas. One was in an urban area. One of the hospitals in the suburban area was a private hospital, and one was a public hospital (that I think was just discussed in a USA Today cover story). Of course they were all different experiences. But it made me think about the spatial-transportation-Poisson problems involved in healthcare. The rural hospitals were underutilized in many respects. (I will say that most of my experience with them had to do with broken limbs. The orthopedists took an hour to get there in each case, but I was given a room/tent by myself to wait.) The capacity and service of the suburban hospitals depended on what time of day I was there. The urban hospital was an experience in itself. I also fully admit that I went to the emergency room a few times for non-emergency reasons but Mom reasons. Today I would have sucked it up or have gone to an urgent care facility.
This post really has no point, and I have no answers. But it shows how complicated of a problem healthcare really is and shows how bad of an idea it might be to push something through Congress to create the illusion that you are "doing something."
(This post made me think about some of these issues.)
3 comments:
Healthcare is a quagmire and I really feel sorry for Obama and his followers for trying to "reform" it. Sometimes you just have to see that something is a lost cause and that there's no way to fix. Sometimes doing nothing is better than "trying to do what's right." Can you imagine what your experiences would have been like if they were administered by the federal government? I'll stick with private insurance.
The thought of government run hospitals scares the hell out of me. All I can think of is the DMV.
The thing that really bothers me about this whole Healthcare "Reform" issue is that everyone is talking about how it is going to eliminate waste and fraud. You would really have to be delusional to think that's going to happen. If anything it's only going to increase waste (added administrative costs) and encourage fraud (see the SEC and CIA for proof of this).
The bottom line is Obama sucks and people were foolish to buy into his "Change you can believe in" mantra. I look forward to seeing this crash and burn.
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