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Let's Face It! We have no "Health Care" in America American health care has sunk to a new low of ridiculous and the New Hampshire Board of Medicine ought to be ashamed of itself. It seems a fat lady, yes, FAT lady, complained to them that her doctor, one Dr. Terry Bennett, made her feel bad because he had the audacity to encourage her to lose weight. He made a further inflammatory statement that her extra pounds could kill her! Did the NH Board tell the woman she stop whining about her hurt feelings and thank her doctor for giving proper medical advice? No! Instead they asked Dr. Bennett to take a special education class and apologize to the woman. He refused to take the class but he did write an apology letter. It seems he was afraid he would lose his license to practice if he didn't at least make this pitiful woman feel better. My feeling about this whole thing is America has a love affair with eating that is almost pathological. It is sacred territory and doctors dare not suggest they curb any of their desires to eat themselves to death. During my decade long career as a medical sign language interpreter, I observed both doctor recommendations and patient reactions to the food issue. Physicians almost NEVER recommended diet to cure the ailment. They recommend surgery and pills. Instead of telling a gallbladder patient to reduce fats and sugars, they immediately tell them to cut the annoyance out. Instead of telling diabetes patients that can almost always cure adult onset diabetes with a vegetarian diet, they simply tell them to check they blood levels, take some pills or injections, and keep eating the stuff that will eventually cause them to go blind, get their legs cut off, give them a heart attack, or die. Rather than require the patient to go on a strict diet, they offer stomach stapling, regardless of the risks of that surgery and the fact that the bad eating habits will kill them even if the operation is done. Why do doctors across the board behave like this? One reason is lack of proper education in medical school. The second reason is economic. More money is made when you cut people up and hand out drugs. And, third, Americans get all huffy when you tell them the truth and require them to do some actually caring for themselves. Greed drives America. Greed for money and greed for food. Drug companies and insurance companies are in collusion to make a fortune off of drugging Americans, causing them more ill health and addiction than illegal drugs could ever cause. Doctors have become as sleazy as the drug dealer on the corner, handing out pills to make you happy, pills to make you thin, pills to let you keep eating garbage, and, if that doesn't work to make you happy, a knife is sure to do the trick. When a doctor DOES make an effort to actually provide HEALTH care to his clients, he is slammed by his greedy patients and drummed out of the industry; he is brought up on charges or fired by the insurance company owned corporation he is enslaved by. I haven't been to a doctor in twenty-five years (with the one emergency surgery for a tubal pregnancy). After one very annoying in hospital birth experience, I opted for an unattended home birth. I don't do well-woman visits because I have seen test results for pap smears to be horribly unreliable and crushing my breasts repeatedly in that medieval contraption seems to be no more reliable than doing my own self-exam in the shower. And what will going to a physician for menopause symptoms do for me? Doctors are forced into encouraging women to take hormones because the drug companies in collusion with the corporate clinics require the doctors to do so; after all, fifty percent of the population on medication for a decade is one heck of a brilliant money maker. I was also one of those told to have my gallbladder out the last time I ever saw a doctor because I had a horrible agonizing attack. I was appalled at the thought of that surgery and decided I was at fault for that attack considering my week's consumption of food was entirely disgusting. I went back to being a vegetarian, and, lo and behold - unless I overdosed on cheese, buttered popcorn, and cakes - I had no problem with my gallbladder. My little friend is still tucked up inside me. I love good health care practitioners. On occasion I have gone to a naturopath, a chiropractor, or a massage therapist. I love our trauma centers; when you have been shot or stabbed or hit by a truck, these doctors are absolutely amazing. I love midwives who still follow the totally natural birthing methods. But, the rest of our health care system is a mess. When one out of four woman has to get a C-section, this is proof doctors don't know how birth works, but know how insurance companies pay. There is too little money made on vaginal births and they take a whole lot of time and energy. There is also the higher risk of lawsuit and even though there are more risks, complications and long term health issues from having c-sections, lawyers can defend those actions with clever "emergency" arguments even if the emergency really never existed. When fixable problems aren't fixed naturally, but have pills and surgery thrown at them, this is not health care but horrendously bad medical practice. When dying people are not allowed to die peacefully at home with their loved ones, this is sheer cruelty. There are caring doctors out there, but they are constrained and penalized by the corporate takeover of health care. When we return to the days when a citizen of this country could walk into a doctors office, pay a reasonable price out of pocket for the visit, maybe then we will have doctors be able to practice real medicine again and give advice that actually IS good for your health. Fat lady, you should be thanking your lucky stars you had a doctor with ethics enough to tell you the truth. He was a doctor who cared more about you than making himself money. Thank you, Dr. Bennett; you actually know what the Hippocratic Oath means. Bless you!
The Pat Brown Criminal Profiling Agency |