My health insurance ended on November 30, 2012. At my age (any age, really), not having health coverage is pretty scary, but right away, a friend (timing by God, I am sure) gave me information on how to get into a local health care system for people with no insurance. Silly me, I didn't think this would take long....nor be so hard. I am learning about a reality a lot of people deal with all the time and for long periods of time.
I was accepted, but there are no "new patient" appoinments until February at the earliest and maybe not until June, I was told to go to the Emergency Room to get my maintenance presecriptions filled until I can get an appointment. Again, silly me, I didn't think it would take more than a couple of hours--but it took over six. And I was told that I need to access a "free clinic" system to get a primary care doctor since I have some conditions that would be better managed with "continuity of care." "Call first thing tomorrow morning," the very nice women said.
I agree that I would prefer "continuity of care," since some of the things I am dealing with should really be monitored by blood work every few months. But when I called the "free clinics" this morning, the first one told me they weren't accepting patients from the system I was accepted into. The second discovered that I am not actually in that system, but in the "Indigent Care" system, so all my medical needs need to be taken care of by the first system. When I called that system, that was confirmed, and I "just need to keep calling, ma'am."
I got three of my four prescriptions--for this month, anyway. But one isn't available (although I may be able to get it another way), and now I know I will have to go back in less than a month unless an appointment opens up. I am not complaining here, becauseat least I have some access to health care, but I also learned a whole lot from being part of this new (for me) reality. There are a whole lot of people who deal with this difficult process all the time for their entire families...and you can't work on a day when you have to try to get health care or prescriptions because it will probably take all day...and if you can't work and have children, you may have to take them with you to sit in waiting rooms where they may be exposed to other people's illnesses, because you almost certainly can't afford child care. But it's the only option you have to get care for illnesses that will only get worse and even life-threatening if they are not attended to--and you had better not lose your temper during the process, or leave because you can't stand waiting (one person did that), or you may not get the care you need...you certainly will not be treated with respect by (some of) the security guards who are there to keep everyone in order...quiet and complacent.
But the scariest thing that happened, that really brought all this home to me, was when a grandmother, whose granddaughter had wheeled her in to get prescriptions (minimum 3-hour process if you are lucky), started having seizures, BIG ones that almost put her on the floor. Her granddaughter started screaming for help, "This is a HOSPITAL, for God's sake, DO something." She seemed to think that we in the waiting room should be able to do something, even though most of us had no idea what to do. Thankfully, there were a couple of women who knew how to hold the grandmother and keep her from biting her tongue or hitting her head on the glass behind her. But in this hospital, less than two blocks from the emergency room, it took more than 20 minutes before EMTs showed up. I didn't see any of the several different security guards who came one at a time to look at the situation do anything (but maybe I just didn't see them...). Two doctors showed up (one from Allergy and Immunology) but they didn't appear to do anything, and an off-duty nurse started helping make the grandmother more comfortable. So this grandmother could have died there in the waiting room of the Ambulatory Care Pharmacy...the staff didn't seem to know what to do, so maybe there are no procedures for when someone in a waiting room full of sick people has a medical emergency. They certainly didn't seem adequate....
So: I am grateful that I was well enough and had the time that it took to get my prescriptions filled. And I am praying for that grandmother and her family, that she will get the care she needs. But my eyes were also opened WIDE to a reality I had never personally encountered before, only heard about. As far as I know, I will have to keep dealing with this for the foreseeable future--but most of these people do not have much if any hope of EVER getting health insurance, so this is their only hope of getting care. I don't know if there may be something I could do to help, advocate, or alleviate any of this. But I did feel that I needed to write this blog, because most of the people I know are probably as unaware of this reality as I was. If you have any suggestions or resources, I would sure like to know about them.
