INSURANCE: Why affordability is key

As a Human Resources professional, I have always been a proponent of affordable Medical Insurance. I had an experience recently that I would like to share to further shed light on the need for all Americans to have medical insurance.

My husband has an inoperable cancerous brain tumor and he began to have seizures Saturday about 5:30 when he and I were out for a walk. He is typically paralyzed on the right side for 20 minutes after the seizure so I left the kids with their dad, ran home for the car, and a passing stranger (THANK YOU, again!) helped get him into the car. But instead of coming around, he started getting worse, and within 10 minutes had another grand mal and was completely unresponsive. So I just drove straight to the ER.

I walked into a packed lobby and harried staff. I explained my situation and she said, "Well, all the rooms are full and we have a four-hour wait. But I could send a nurse out to the car to look at him if you want."

Now, I'm not suggesting everyone in the ER at that time didn't indeed have an emergency but to my untrained eye it sure seemed to me that a lot of the situations could have been seen at many of the urgent cares in town if only the people had insurance and weren't using the ER as a doctor's office. I readily admit this isn't a fully informed conclusion following scientific study but I really believe that my husband didn't get the care he needed that night because too many people didn't have insurance to go to the "regular" doctor.

Thankfully the neurologist's office called back within 15 minutes and called in a prescription to a pharmacy, where I waited 40 minutes to get the meds. Miraculously I was able to get that medicine into him orally; kind of hard to do when someone is having a seizure. He needed the IV that the ER would have administered.

We still don't know what damage was caused by that four hours. I hope those of you opposed to affordable health insurance realize that everyone does pay now for everyone to be insured... it's just not as directly. I hope my experience will benefit your perspective and you do not have to have the same experience yourself or with a loved one to see this situation in the same way.

MARYBETH RANUM

Coeur d'Alene