Comments on: A Day at LSU Clinic

By: Heather

Heather — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 18:32:34 +0000

I don’t understand how it is acceptable to wait all day for an “appointment.” My husband and I experienced job loss in the last 6 months and we ended up losing our health insurance. While we have found new jobs, we do not have the option for health insurance through our jobs and cannot afford to purchase our own policy. We just miss qualifying for the free care, so we are paying for every bit of the care and testing I have received.
I waited for 30 hours on a total of 5 visits to LSU for an urgent care visit, scheduled referral “appointments” and testing. I still don’t have a diagnosis. I am facing at least 2 more tests and 2 more follow up visits. How do you expect people to keep their jobs and pay for their needs and stay off of assistance when the LSU system continues to treat the patients like a herd of cattle and without regard to their time. Not everyone going there gets free care. As you expressed many are working class people who need extensive care. That doesn’t come cheap or efficiently.
Unlike your experience, I saw multiple employees who were enjoying conversations and coffee and who did a lot of walking back and forth without really seeing or doing anything with/for the patients. (No paperwork being transported or anything.) It seemed like many of the employees were just collecting a paycheck for sitting. In fact, the urgent care nurse had a book in the triage room she was reading. She put it down, allowing the table to hold her spot while she stopped long enough to take my vitals. There were 3 people at the urgent care when I got there, yet I was there for 9 hours before being released with no diagnosis.
How does the public option work when this care becomes the norm and people lose their jobs for absenteeism? Who will be left to pay taxes to cover the cost of the public option?
I was told I had to wait at least 2 months for a CT scan to rule out brain cancer unless I went to urgent care or the ER to get it done on an emergency basis. I don’t know about you, but if cancer was causing my problems, I wouldn’t want to wait until it was too late to find out I had it and have a chance to try to fight it. What do you think is going to happen when more and more people rely on the public option? More and more people will die without the chance to even find out what is making them ill. More young people will collect social security for having lost their parents or spouses when they could’ve had a fighting chance if only they could’ve seen a doctor or had the test they required. It’s a vicious cycle, and there must be a better way. Perhaps reducing the debt acquired by doctors for med school and reducing the cost of tests like CT scans, MRIs, etc., could make it more affordable for more people to get the care they need without the need for assistance.

By: M Styborski

M Styborski — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 22:00:19 +0000

You know who could have used a good health care plan? Mary Jo Kopechne.

By: Mark Folse

Mark Folse — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 14:11:30 +0000

Mardiclas, I think what I’ve said elsewhere about the dismemberment of public education applies here: New Orleans is one large experiment in alternative approaches to medicine, housing, education etc. that will be remembered with the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment for its monumental disregard of the welfare of its subjects.

You would not be allowed to do to prisoners what we routinely do here to school children and the old and infirm: experiment on them without their consent.

You may argue that social experimentation is not the same and that we are free to leave (a suggestion I will file away with the Love It or Leave It suggestions made by the political right).

By: mardiclaw

mardiclaw — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:24:04 +0000

I’ve been to the Lord and Taylor building many times.. its frightening, but at the same time, another friend of mine sat in an emergency room chair/bed at University hospital for over two weeks, while waiting for them to address the blood clot about to explode on his leg. Since K, we have been put in a situation, which we still haven’t been able to pull ourselves out of. However, for simple healthcare, the st thomas clinic has proven time and time again, to be a shining example of what a doctor visit should be. this country is drowning in television commercials for big pharm companies, and then followed months later by the law firms cleaning up… A friend from the west coast said she had never seen so many commercials EVER on tv back home.

sometimes I think nola is nothing more than a medical test group for the rest of the nation.

By: jimmy scoville

jimmy scoville — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 20:39:24 +0000

Horribly frightening. All we’ve been through since K. & so much stays illogically bad. 4 years. World War 2 was fought during that time. We as a Nation are capable of so much if driven – the Space Race for example. Why can’t this Country get this right? It burns the edges of my heart & continues my disilusionment. I’m so sorry you & your husband had to go through that idiotic abuse of sanity.