Posts
Ted Kennedy is going to die soon. He has a malignant brain tumor (glioma) and it has a bad prognosis. Like him or hate him, it doesn't matter. It is just a reality. Most patients in that situation usually are in hospice care but not Ted. I defer to my last posting on the Senator from Massachusetts about putting his money where his tumor is. I explain there that he can't make healthcare policy that controls costs and then charge the country millions every time he comes up ill due to his cancer. Well, it happened again yesterday. Good old Ted had a seizure at the inauguration of President Obama. The announcers on TV stated that he travels around with a team of physicians. Funny, not many of my brain cancer patients have a team of physicians with them? Ted is supposedly doing fine and will be out of the hospital soon after the best and fastest care was given to him at the Washington Hospital Center. In a future healthcare system of rationing and cost control, which Kennedy is promoting, will the general public get the same care as Ted?
Radiation exposure during a CT scan may be more than you think
-
Originally posted in Insidermedicine The amount of radiation exposure
associated with computed tomography (CT) scans as well as the increased risk
of cance...
6 hours ago
22 comments:
Perhaps, as a politician, his only standards are double standards.
Like him or not, and his situation at the moment perhaps privileged, I'm sort of put off by this tasteless headline. Yes, change needs to happen, but let's not stoop to such cruel, cavalier language ("Seizure later"? Come on. And "Good old Ted had a seizure"? Uh, I'm sure he didn't mean to, and would in fact rather not have. I do get your point, but a little sensitivity and decorum, please. Yes, even at PJB.)
the patients who did not receive the care Kennedy is receiving did not receive "sensitivity and decorum" good old saying "truth hurts"
Ted Kennedy is a murderer who can't die fast enough for me.
Die Ted die! Tonite would be cool. Right now would be cooler.
*checks google news*
Dammit!
Sure hope the death wisher to Ted Kennedy only plays a doctor on TV, but is in fact a wanna be judge and jury style vigilante who has no business treating any living creature on any level.
now Doc Douggy! regarding your satirizing the terminal disease of an advocate of working people, i would say that when the fancy folks get the best health care available, it should set a precedent. As of now, if you want truth, there are plenty of hard working citizens who pay a higher chunk of taxes proportionately who get no healthcare coverage at all. Single payer is the way to go!
The headline was shockingly insensitve and the contempt for Kennedy was palpable.
Wealthy and privileged champions of the poor are routinely subjected to this same treatment, that of being called hypocrites simply because they live better than the people that they advocate for. How dare they. In recent times, this includes Kerry, Edwards and Gore. All demonized the same way by the same sources, and you susceptible conservatives have dutifully and uncritically downloaded and regurgitated what you have been conditioned to on cue. Typical.
Yeah, the health care mess is all the hypocrite Kennedy's fault. How dare he have better health care that he didn't advocate for. And how dare he not put himself on hospice. Or have a seizure at the inauguration. What did that cost us? Maybe they should assassinate him, too, like his brothers, and save a few bucks. Sickening.
When I read the conservative voices here, I'm glad and proud to say that I am not one of you, and am nothing like you. How boring, and how embarrassing you are.
Anything for a laugh? I think not. Public humiliation of someone stricken with cancer is over the limit. I get a feeling from your tone that you like to see him croak.
I'm disappointed. Won't renew my subscription.
There was nothing funny in the post. It wasn't meant to be funny. It was mean to bring up a point about healthcare costs, double standards, and rationing. Try reading it again without reading into it. Is it my understanding that even bringing up the case of Senator Kennedy as a point of discussion is out of bounds because he is Ted Kennedy? If that is true then please do NOT renew. I don't need your money that much.
Doug
It's me again from January 24, 2009 2:20 AM. I've had some afterthoughts.
[1] To you who posted a wish to see Kennedy dead, I can only add that I'm glad that I'm glad that you're not his doctor. If you were, he would not have been able to drag himself from his near deathbed into the senate last summer to cast his first vote in months due to life threatening disease. What was that vote? Oh, just the 60th vote to override the Bush veto of the legislation to prevent the draconian 10% physician pay cut. Why was that coming? It was needed to fatten the Medicare HMO payment for insurers. You see, America can't afford to pay both (LOL), and it chose them over you and your patients, whose access to you (well, to me, anyway) would have been further restricted by those cuts. Was that important? You tell me. Without that vote, you don't have 2/3 of the senate and you don't override that veto.
You people who despise Kennedy because the conservative talking points say to do so need to recognize who it was that saved you and your patients, under what conditions he did that, and who it was that he saved them from. Yes, to you who called Kennedy a murderer, he dragged himself from a river forty years ago in much the same condition for much less honorable reasons that day. But that was a youthful indiscretion, and he got away with it for the same reason that he can afford his health care, and for the same reason that Bush got away with being AWOL and will get away with illegal wire taps and torturing: the good fortune of being born into wealth and political power. His life, like that of his two dead brothers, has been dedicated to public service and the common man ever since.
Do you also call Mr. Bush a murderer? Or a torturer or a war criminal? I didn’t think so. So who's got the double standard here?
[2] And to Doug: It is true that Senator Kennedy is being treated better than America can afford to treat the average citizen. But he can have better than that now for two reasons: [a] as a US Senator, he benefits from a health care program that will give him all of this at no charge and [b] if that weren't in place, he would be able to make the same choices and pay the bills because he was born into wealth. That makes him fortunate, not a hypocrite. He's not responsible for the fact of either [a] or [b], and he should not be expected to take less than he wants and can afford. If you're angry that we're paying his medical bills, fine. But why disparage the senator for circumstances not of his making? Would you be happier if he paid those bills himself? I'm sure that he could and would. And perhaps will. But if he does, he'll be the first wealthy person that I ever heard of who didn't let the public pay whatever bill it would. My wealthy seniors ALL use their Medicare wherever they can AND the cash their Social Security checks. If anybody has a double standard here, it's those that berate Kennedy in isolation, but not other wealthy seniors. I don't recall PJ taking a position when Cheney had pacemaker surgery. Do you think that Cheney paid for that pacemaker?
So just what is Kennedy's double standard? None. What is it that he wants for himself that he doesn't want for you? Just what option is he exercising that he wouldn't want you to exercise if you could? I'm sure that he would like everybody to have his health care plan and his personal fortune as well if it were possible. But they can't, and it's not possible for him to offer as good as he gets. That doesn't make him a hypocrite.
And no, it is not true that most people "in that situation usually are in hospice care." And if it were, it would be because they chose hospice care. There is no pressure for anybody to do that.
I love you doug, you de man, I'm feeling you here. So much posturing and sanctimony in the comments. But Senator Ted is profanity in the flesh. He is the poster child for the term limits movement. He has avoided personal responsibility throughout his life. Any self respecting man in his situation would acknowlege his inability to perform the duties of his office, but of course that never bothered him while drinking and womanizing. Ted has no shame, and therefore neither should you, Doug
Correcting a technical error concerning Sen Kennedy's deathbed vote: It was not the override itself in which he cast the crucial vote, but the vote to end the Republican filibuster that would have killed the bill. Instead, it came up for vote, passed by a comfortable margin, was vetoed, and that veto was overridden. The effect was the same: Kennedy saved the bill with his vote, which was his first in months.
So, the sentence in the January 24, 2009 9:40 AM post above should be amended to say, "Was that important? You tell me. Without that vote, you don't have 2/3 of the senate and you don't end that filibuster or enact that legislation"
[From "Ted Kennedy Makes Surprise Senate Appearance, Casts 60th Vote To Break GOP Filibuster On Medicare"]
Anonymous It's me again,
Hasn't Senator Kennedy been supporting universal coverage that would prevent patients from seeking any out-of-plan care? If so, how is that not hypocrisy?
Here is one article about that.
My husband is several years past his GBM diagnosis, surviving because of
alert doctors and early treatment. The standard treatment, with an expensive drug and
surgery and radiotherapy was paid for mostly by insurance through my employer. Though
grateful for all this, it is still true that brain tumor survival is a mixed blessing for
the individual, the family, and the community. Certainly the investment, whatever its
source, in his treatment and followup care could pay for many primary care visits and
preventive care for other patients. In a healthcare system based on the greatest good for
the greatest number, and with limited resources, the money for his care would have been used differently. What the personally responsible decision is when faced with such a diagnosis seems really unclear to me -
To rogue medic.
The link you provided didn't mention Kennedy. I have been trying to determine what the specifics of Kennedy's proposals are, and it appears that all that can be said is that he favors universal, single payor coverage for all who want it. These articles HERE and HERE are typical of what I've found. They basically show Kennedy trying to build consensus, and I imagine that what he would end up with is what he can get others to agree to.
But my major point is not that Kennedy's ideas are the best, but that he doesn't deserve the contempt or disrespect being shown him by many of our colleagues. I have no doubt that he wants the best he can get for America. If America were willing to spend on health care like it does on war and bail-outs, for example, then he would probably come up with a more generous wish list. What he does advocate is not so much a reflection of how little he wants you to have, but of how much he can get you given that he wants everybody to have something.
With that constraint further constrained by corporate forces and their political proxies that really don't care about this problem, he may not be able to offer you much. But once again, that is not a reflection of a double standard of the man. How much could you or I get as a US Senator with a passion for the issue with the constraints and oppositions he contends with? Not much. Does that mean that we want that little for our neighbors? No. It means that we want at least that much for every citizen.
I don't want to get suckered into arguing the details of something that I am not qualified to argue and know little about. Nor am I suggesting that Kennedy's ideas are better than any others. Merely that I am appaled that so much negativity is attributed to a man that, from what I can see, is trying to get the best he can for everybody. And if some of his are ideas are bad, I have no incentive to disagree or argue otherwise.
But those are technical and realpolitik considerations which are not my expertise or interest, not ethical ones, which are. My only message in all of these posts is that I don't believe the antipathy for the man is justified even if harsh criticism of his ideas is.
It is my opinion that conservatives, none of whom I would dare say would have come to these hateful conclusions on their own given only neutral facts of Kennedy's work, have been taught to hate this man because conservative central, which doesn't give a rat's ass about the average American, objects to such ideas and smears anyone who advocates for them WITHOUT EXCEPTION. In response, they disseminate an ad hominem message of personal hate about anyone who tries.
And conservative Americans don't notice, they just fall into line and begin complaining on cue. None of them ever notices this, or says, "you know, if my own sweet mother wanted to help the American people in any other way than with an unnecessary war or a corporate bailout, such as with a bailout of cousin Eddie who's about to lose his house, or health insurance for cousin Eddie with the bad heart, there is NO POSSIBLE WAY that she could do that without ending up being called the spawn of Satan, and without conservative people like many here spitting when they say her name as a result."
And if that is true, it means that anyone with ideas that are good for average Americans but not for the people who don't give a crap about them would be resisted with ad hominem campaigns, that there would be no such thing as a champion of the average Joe that was allowed to go unscathed and be respected. And guess what. Bingo! There aren't any. By the most amazing coincidence, evry such person has been vilified and is dutifully shown contempt by you know who. But that isn't a flagrant enough pattern to allow them to figure that out.
All that you have to do to earn the reputaion (unfairly) imputed to Kennedy, Edwards, Kerry and Gore is to resist those forces, and you will become the moral equivalent of Charles Manson within a year. And people like the ones posting here will be the vectors. Didn't you hear them all gagging at that roll call. Like Pavlov's dogs. If anyone else comes along like Senator Mom on behalf of people like Cousin Eddie, these people's minds will be conditioned for them, and like clockwork, they will be turned against Mom, Mother Theresa, Santa Claus or anyone else who dares.
Now I'm not naive enough to believe that I can speak to those people or change those minds. This process appears to be irreversible. And God knows that I wish that I knew how to do that to people myself. I could use a few thralls.
But I'll object to them and about them anyway, and point out what is happening, not because I'll change any minds, but I can't stand to see it and say nothing. Those people, like "you da man" aren't necessarily horrible people. But they're not good people either if by good one means more than merely not bad. Nor are they particularly perceptive people.
And now I've crossed a line. But you know what? Who cares? I'm not going to edit those comments out, because frankly, at this moment, I don't care who these opinions irritate. Certainly not people who wish Kennedy's death or make light of his misfortune.
Anonymous,
The article I linked was just the easiest to find on the topic. I was not stating that I have been following the debate on this topic, but that this is one proposal that I would not be surprised to find Senator Kennedy supporting. I tend not to follow his activities, since I am not in Massachusetts. It has been my impression that he has been on the far left in his policies. The policy of outlawing private coverage (or out of pocket payment) is just the kind of thing I would expect him to support.
As for people taking satisfaction from his illness, I do not agree with that. There are a lot of people, who feel that he should have been in prison for a long time for killing Mary Jo Kopechne. Did alcohol contribute to his actions? I don't know. Driving into a lake must be a sobering experience, but his physical appearance suggests that alcohol has contributed to his decisions since then.
I am not in favor of the current wars or of the ever expanding policy of bailouts that the Obama administration seems to be intent on continuing. The government is not there to protect us from making bad decisions. Although, I do think the government should be requiring more plain language disclosure of risks.
The attempt to prevent risk is extremely dangerous. We do not end up taking responsibility for any risks, so this leads us to a society that is mostly irresponsible.
You write, What he does advocate is not so much a reflection of how little he wants you to have, but of how much he can get you given that he wants everybody to have something.
I completely disagree with this approach of the government. We need to move away from the government as a provider of everything, but try to get the government out of so many of the places it has worked its way into. With all of the government involvement, the small business is not able to compete with the large corporation. The government should not be driving the small business out of business in favor of the large corporation. It does not matter if the Republicans do this or the Democrats.
We have too much government. The solution of the government to the problem of too much government - more government.
The vitriolic statements concerning Senator Kenneday that have been submitted herein are absolutely disgusting. The authors bring shame to the medical profession. It is time to heal and stop the hating.
Nan,
You wrote:
The vitriolic statements concerning Senator Kenneday that have been submitted herein are absolutely disgusting. The authors bring shame to the medical profession.
I can understand your anger. Your response is similar to the angry response of those who hate Senator Kennedy.
It is time to heal and stop the hating.
Oh, the hypocrisy! Are you having a Come to Limbaugh moment?
If you want to convince somebody that their behavior is unacceptable, you will only be convincing some of those, who already agree with you. You will be embarrassing some of those, who agree with you.
absolutely disgusting and bring shame to the medical profession are not words that heal or that stop the hating.
Bank on this ladies and gents - the sober, mature, and overtly compassionate posters on this site which advocate single-payer systems and who purport to suport the "working man" (the rest of us being sooo leisurely in clinics and hospitals across the land at all hours)...yes these merchants of compassion will resort to the use of force every time to make themselves feel better while distributing the efforts and cash of others. Doctors who bleat compassion at the expense of others' freedom are the worst of the bunch, however much they want to, ahem , "heal." As for Uncle Teed, would that Mary Jo had enjoyed so long a life.
I found this site using [url=http://google.com]google.com[/url] And i want to thank you for your work. You have done really very good site. Great work, great site! Thank you!
Sorry for offtopic
Who knows where to download XRumer 5.0 Palladium?
Help, please. All recommend this program to effectively advertise on the Internet, this is the best program!
Hello !.
might , probably curious to know how one can reach 2000 per day of income .
There is no need to invest much at first. You may begin to receive yields with as small sum of money as 20-100 dollars.
AimTrust is what you haven`t ever dreamt of such a chance to become rich
The firm represents an offshore structure with advanced asset management technologies in production and delivery of pipes for oil and gas.
Its head office is in Panama with affiliates around the world.
Do you want to become really rich in short time?
That`s your choice That`s what you really need!
I`m happy and lucky, I started to get real money with the help of this company,
and I invite you to do the same. It`s all about how to select a correct partner utilizes your savings in a right way - that`s AimTrust!.
I take now up to 2G every day, and what I started with was a funny sum of 500 bucks!
It`s easy to join , just click this link http://buzihupohy.freecities.com/lygufat.html
and go! Let`s take our chance together to feel the smell of real money
Hi !.
You re, I guess , perhaps curious to know how one can make real money .
There is no need to invest much at first. You may commense to get income with as small sum of money as 20-100 dollars.
AimTrust is what you haven`t ever dreamt of such a chance to become rich
The firm incorporates an offshore structure with advanced asset management technologies in production and delivery of pipes for oil and gas.
Its head office is in Panama with structures everywhere: In USA, Canada, Cyprus.
Do you want to become a happy investor?
That`s your chance That`s what you really need!
I`m happy and lucky, I began to get real money with the help of this company,
and I invite you to do the same. It`s all about how to select a proper partner who uses your funds in a right way - that`s the AimTrust!.
I earn US$2,000 per day, and what I started with was a funny sum of 500 bucks!
It`s easy to join , just click this link http://megafokej.builtfree.org/upisyr.html
and lucky you`re! Let`s take our chance together to get rid of nastiness of the life
Post a Comment