Pre-eclampsia and health care
Late last January, in a post about how our next child was going to be a girl I wrote:
I’m really looking forward to the baby’s birth. I do tend to worry about most things, but after everything I’ve seen with our doctor, the hospital, the technology involved in bringing a baby into the world, and a few dozen episodes of Baby Story, I can honestly say that I’m not worried about this baby. Just a few more months to wait now!
The next day, my wife became so sick that I had to take her to the hospital. My wife developed pre-eclampsia, a serious condition which causes high blood pressure, excessive protein loss, and potentially worse symptoms in pregnant women. From what I understand, it’s basically caused when the placenta and the woman’s body start to fight, and the only way to cure it is to deliver the baby. Our pregnancy was only 22 or 23 weeks along, which was just too early for the baby to make it. We lost our baby that weekend, and it took nine full days in the hospital for my wife to reach the point where she could go home again. It was a horrible time for both of us, but the important thing is that my wife is going to make a full recovery and we will hopefully be able to try again.
There are a lot of things to say after something like this, but few that I’d want to share on a blog. One of those few issues have been swirling in my mind for weeks now, so I’m going to let it loose. For me, one of the biggest benefits from writing posts is that it forces me to organize and clarify my thoughts into something more concrete. Or put in another way, it makes me turn my opinion into a position. I might have more to say later, but for now I’m just going to write on our experiences with the health care system.
Health Care
Before this situation happened, I had hardly any experience dealing with hospitals and health care. I’ve never had anything serious happen to me, or most of my family for that matter. After seeing the experience my wife had to go through, I’m very concerned about what might happen in the future if America’s health care system becomes socialized (or more socialized…). Let me describe what happened.
My wife experienced shortness of breath, nausea, and swelling all around her body. She told me that it felt like her body was falling apart. When we went to the hospital, she was immediately admitted and checked over by her doctors. Tests were ordered, which were taken immediately in order to get the results back as soon as possible. From diagnosis to labor to delivery and to recovery, we had immediate assistance and advice from the appropriate specialists, all of whom put my wife’s treatment as the highest priority. Nurses watched her condition closely for the length of the entire stay, making sure that the doctors knew whenever something bad happened. Everything was done to make her better, and it worked. My wife and I were given great care, and I’m very grateful for the doctors, nurses, and medical staff that made us better.
I think that many people would look at this situation and say that we were lucky. After listening and reading most commentary on our country’s health care system, one would think that health care is something that is granted to you by someone, and it’s chance that separates those who don’t get it from those who do. These people are absolutely wrong. While many doctors and nurses played a big part in my wife’s recovery, I think that my wife and I were mostly responsible for it. Months ago, my wife researched local hospitals and picked the one that was the best at handling these types of emergencies. My wife and I are both hard workers who prove our worth every day and bring in steady income and health insurance. We spend our money in a way that allows us to pay for emergencies like this. My point is: We didn’t just happen to have all of this great care fall out of the sky; we made it happen.
If we’re fortunate of anything, it’s that we live in a country that has enough remnants of capitalism that allow us to transform our work into things we need. It’s pretty fantastic, if you think about it. My wife teaches elementary school and I program computers, but what do we get in exchange? Educated kids and computer programs? Hardly. We get anything we want. We get a house, two cars, plenty of food, things to entertain us, and in times of medical emergency we get the attention of incredible doctors who will make us better. No matter what we want, we just have to be able to put in the work to achieve it.
But how long will it be this way? I’m scared that in the next few years, America will adopt a fully socialized health care system that will prevent us from doing what we have to do to take care of ourselves. That’s the real cost of socialized health care: The right to choose what you do with your own life. If you want to choose your hospital… tough luck, you have to go to the one the government tells you. If you want to choose your doctor, too bad… the government tells you who to see. If there is a waiting line to see your doctor and you want to pay for another doctor out-of-your-pocket, don’t bother… that would be a crime. If you’re a doctor and you want to try a better treatment or work extra hours to see more patients… there goes your medical license. Instead of a system somewhat like today where patients and doctors are able to make their own decisions with their own intellect and free will (though, there is a lot of government influence today), everybody gets locked into a system where your only real choice is to comply with the law or not.
What would have happened if our system was socialized today? What if my wife had to wait an extra day before she was admitted to the hospital? What if they let her go early and told her to recover at home in bed? What if any of the great doctors we saw had left because they didn’t want to work in that system? Would my wife had been ok? Possibly, but that’s not a gamble that politicians or socialized-health-care advocates have a right to make.
I felt strongly about this issue before, but now whenever I see debates online or on tv I keep thinking back to this single, concrete example. And it infuriates me to think that anyone would get between us and the health care we arranged for, especially when that interference is done for the supposed purpose of helping us! If someone wants health care for everyone, then my suggestion is to find someone who doesn’t have health insurance and buy it for them. Find someone with a medical bill and pay it. Just whatever you do, stay out of our way.
[Update 2008-03-16: I’m disabling comments on this thread. I really appreciate everybody’s well wishes, and we’ve received a lot of them! I don’t want to make a thread where people feel they have offer condolences, and given the subject matter I’m guessing that most people who disagree with my stance on medical care aren’t going to argue with me here. Don’t worry about us, we’ve had some time and we’re going to be ok. Really.]
Tags: [health care, preeclampsia, socialized health care, universal health care]