The World's Greatest HealthCare System Killed Grandpa - The REAL Death Panel

This happened three years ago.

My father-in-law had an aortic aneurism near his kidneys that his GP believed to be imminently close to bursting. I drove from Harrisburg to Johnstown to pick him up and from there to Cleveland so he could be seen at the Cleveland Clinic, which apparently is one of the leading facilities for such things. We had to wait three months for an appointment. After an entire day of testing, scans, and all kinds of mean nasty things they was doing to him there at the clinic, we finally got to speak to the doctor again (first time was all of three minutes).

She said the aneurism was only 2.5 cm and they normally didn't operate until it was 5.0 cm. He wanted to have it fixed anyway. She said the risk was too great because he was over 80. I asked if she would operate if it was 5.0 cm. She said yes so I pointed out that the risk would be the same either way and he wanted it to be fixed now. He made a point of filling out the "do not resuscitate" paperwork early in the day in case they had to operate and something went horribly wrong. He was ready to be admitted, and fully expected to be when we arrived.

She danced around the issue for a while, but FINALLY we got around to the TRUTH of the matter. The insurance company wouldn't pay for it because of his age and the hospital wouldn't do it without pre-approval. Self-pay wasn't an option for that class of operation, even if he could have afforded it - pre-approval or nothing. I asked if the insurance would pay for it if it was at 5.0 cm (knowing she couldn't answer) and she said I'd have to take it up with them. She admitted they had gotten approval in similar situations for younger patients. I don't remember which insurance company it was, but it wasn't something crappy - BC/BC or similar. It was all about his age.

I took him home - this was May. On July 3, we got the call. It had ruptured. All he wanted was to make it through August so he could go on the family camping trip we had planned since December - my sister-in-law's family, ours, and him at a cabin in Cook's Forest. They had always done that when my wife was a kid. He didn't make it, and we didn't go either.

The GREATEST HEALTHCARE SYSTEM IN THE WORLD killed grandpa. There's your fucking DEATH PANEL!

:rant:

shouldn't the patients desires come first?:cry:

:hug:

I wonder, could I copy your story and put it on my blog? I'll attribute it to your DU persona or not, as you prefer. And if you'd rather not, that's fine. I have a bunch of conservative readers whose minds I'm trying to change.

Do NOT post this on your blog, but he went through a dramatic change in the time I knew him.

I met him in 85 (shortly after meeting my wife - still happily married). He was a raging bigot at the time, but that's how he was raised. My wife took a job in S.C. teaching kindergarten in a public school (almost all black - whites attended "the academy"). He came to visit one time and was coloring with the children when it hit him - "all these kids are black!"

That was a life changing experience for him. He was a wonderful man and perhaps the best friend I've ever had other than my wife. I cried while I was writing that, but it needed to be said.

My grandparents on my father's side were very wealthy, and they were also bigots but had no idea it was wrong. They were also involved in endless charities and fundraisers, and were generous and kind and smart and I miss them. People can change, people can learn, and the whole of a person is not defined by one personality characteristic.

Thank you.

He grew up in rural PA. There WERE no non-whites. That's ignorance. In SC it was hate. In the nine months my wife was there, she was assaulted and stabbed with a sharp stick (not a major wound), spit on for holding the door for an elderly black gentleman, and verbally abused on a regular basis for working with those little (you know the word)s. That is hate. That's the GOP base. Ignorance is much easier to cure - as he proved, one simple experience can do it.

On a side note, after the kindergarten event, one of the few blacks in the town would go with us to visit him. He is a great guy and my kids call him "Uncle". My FIL also loved him. He had moved to the town to go to college in the early 70's (and had a huge fro at the time - cute picture). He had more than one occasion when a local had said something like (in his words) "Goooo-OOOOO-LLLy. I ain't never seen a black man before!" He did his best Gomer Pyle when describing it.

Same deal.

Out past Oil City. That's about as whitebread as whitebread gets - crust cut off and everything - well, at least it was in the 30's. He enlisted in the Navy in WW-II when he was 17.

Get this story out to all who will listen. While there is always a medical decision to balance the progress of the disease vs. the patient's age and surgery risk, the U.S. is the only place where the financial decision takes precedence over the medical decision.

take part willingly in such a system, like the one in the OP, and who, instead of remembering their oath, support the profit-before-people model. I know that many of them don't, and kudos to them, but far too many DO, and usually the ones who are in the position to actually do something (hello AMA!) not only don't care but fight to preserve the status quo.

This was an ideal end-result for the insurance company.

I'm sorry for your loss.

Have you considered a lawsuit against the insurance company?

One of his favorite rants was frivolous lawsuits. He hated lawyers (except for the one he used - he had him as a high school student). The McD's coffee case was one of his favorite "Oh Bull-shiiiit" examples.

Even if we had gone that route, what is the case? They denied pre-approval based on whatever actuarial tables they are using. I have a BA in math, but I can't go up against an army of PhD actuarials! I'm not THAT good! You have to have more money than you expect to gain to take on a mega company. The guy who invented the variable-speed windshield wiper (first came out in the mid-70's) FINALLY won his suit against GM a year or so ago. After all that time and all of the legal fees, the massive settlement made a nice lining in the law firm's coffer and he was left with a massive debt. He was still happy because it proved he was right, but at some great cost.

It would be a difficult case, one that would most likely require identifying other victims and comparing coverages of many insurance companies. I'm sure that it would also be a prolonged and painful experience for your family.

But I am a bit sad that we've been conditioned to believe that lawsuits regarding mistakes/decisions that cost lives could ever be "frivolous". Going after money is our only chance to punish corporations who only care about money.

I do think that your representatives would be interested in hearing this story, unless you live in OK, that is.

I'm very sorry that your family experienced this.

:hug:

The healthcare system is driven by insurance. They pay the bills. So the system worked wonderfully. Everyone saved a ton of money and profit risk was avoided.

This is the system that all the crazy people are shouting for at the town halls.

Along with keeping the system as is they also want tort reform to prevent families from suing insurance companies for making profit based decisions like the one your family encountered.


I am very sorry for your loss and deeply angered...yet again.

Oh well, without them FOX wouldn't have an audience!

said a hip replacement would help, but his insurance wouldn't pay for a man his age to have the surgery. So he is now virtually wheelchair-bound. And to top it off, the insurance would only cover a manual wheelchair, nothing for an electric. So he's also pretty much housebound, as his drive is gravel and he can't go across the yard to get to his workshop. This is a VERY active man, who bonded with my husband over their puttering and fix-it obsession.

But his wife, who is the same age, with the same insurance, fell in the bathroom, and fractured her hip. They did the hip replacement.

I told him he should throw himself down the stairs, so he could get the care he needs.

but guidelines are not decisions and it is the doctors and patients who need to make the decisions. Age is one factor, but general health is a much more important factor in determining what is best for the individual. We need to find the sweet spot between denying care to those who can benefit from it and inflicting medical procedures on those who will never recover and who wish only to be left in peace.

the Cleveland Clinic is absolutely horrendous when it comes to money/insurance issues. ALL they give a damn about is money. PERIOD. END OF STORY. If you don't have perfect insurance or money, you mean NOTHING to them. All that ballyhoo about it being the best in the world, most caring, yaddayadda, blahblahblah, is BULLSHIT. What they REALLY mean is best IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY AND POWER. Their doctors are the worst with that, they ONLY care about money, PERIOD. They're supposed to be a "nonprofit" care institution, but all they care about is profit and people suffer terribly every day there because of it. And you go just a few blocks from where they are and you'll be in a neighborhood where the only time anyone living there will step inside the Clinic is to clean it or serve food in it, period. Greedy fuckers, that's what they are.

I was involved in a research study there once a decade ago, where I didn't have to pay anything for the treatment. EVERY day for two weeks before the first scheduled treatment, I'd get calls from their billing and "pre-approval" dept. wanting to know my insurance information and if it was pre-approved. EVERY. FUCKING. DAY. It didn't matter how many fucking times I'd tell them that it was a research study and, therefore, I didn't have to pay. Several times, they were even rude about it, stating that I shouldn't come in for the treatment if I didn't have insurance information and pre-approval. Finally, I had enough and referred them to the head of the study, and told them not to bother me anymore or I'd consider it harassment. The head of the study was able to straighten them out, finally, but that's the way they are, unless you're a ME sheik or something, then they roll out the carpet.

They certainly spent enough money on the flooring! It looks like a damn palace.

It doesn't cover things like that.

But in the majority of cases, not unless the aneurysm is 5 cm in diameter or more because that's the accepted standard of care as established by doctors, predominantly vascular surgeons, to be specific. Smaller aneurysms are watched and/or treated medically without surgery unless there is some sort of concomitant medical condition that warrants surgical intervention sooner.

I heard that since the cash for clunkers program was so successful, that Obama is suggesting starting one for people. In this program they will pay you to have a baby if you turn in one of your unproductive grandparents.