Americuh!

So I've been partaking of a friend's generosity in the form of a shared Netflix account and so far I've been plundering the documentary listings with regularity that would make any senior's bowels go green with envy.

How's that for an opening? I should just quit now.

A couple of these documentaries have depicted the American healthcare system in varying capacities: as the focus of the story, a minor subplot, even a plot device. Now, I really try not to take many solid cues from the media as it just never feels quite right to accept something that has been influenced by many forces before the finished product (and all its missing pieces) gets presented to me. It (media) actually has begun to offend my sensibilities and now I get disgruntled because I can't check source references or know that the story was published objectively by a peer-reviewed entity.  So much communication contains, relies upon, and is sustained by misinformation that it is very difficult to differentiate and I know I'm just beginning to learn.

I digress...

Suffice it to say that, personally, I know the American system and its inner-workings VERY loosely and have no first-hand experience with how it functions; so, if we could keep that disclaimer at the back of our minds, I'll continue.

It breaks my heart.

I wanted to insert profanity here for emphasis but I'll let my yes be yes.

Now the explanation.

I don't understand a lot of things about the US system.  For instance, I don't understand how people have to make a choice between seeing a doctor and paying their rent.  I also don't understand how a family with a paranoid schizophrenic child suffering an acute episode has to first call a customer service wonk from their insurance to see which hospital they're allowed to go to and for how long their child can stay before they will no longer be covered.  I don't get how nurses are (forced?) told to discharge patients who have no coverage or means to pay for treatment.  I don't get how a serious illness or serious trauma can result in the remortgaging of your house or the seizure of your house because you had to use it as collateral for your ballooning hospital bills and now you can't pay because you're sick.  I don't understand how being sick precludes you from receiving coverage that would help you to stop being sick.

I guess overall I don't get how the issue of money runs even with the state of health of the individual.

I come from a far away land where we have different way of doing things and dammit if we don't have our own injustices and problems to work out.  Please don't mistake this for an argument whereby I'm just asking why the US doesn't just do what we do; I mean, they should, but that's rather trite.

I am on my way to becoming a registered nurse in this country and I'm getting somewhat excited to get done with school and get back out working again. My excitement is buoyed by the healthcare system that I will be representing because I know that the number one priority is to be the patient and the health of the people as a whole. However, as I get more and more glimpses into the US system, I have realized that there exists a situation where I would walk away from my profession because I couldn't reconcile my actions with my thoughts.

You get paid as a nurse...

 

...and this is great; but what happens when you don't believe in/agree with the system you represent?  What would you do?

This is what keeps bothering me.  Obviously people raised in the the US will be acclimatized to their healthcare system and some will end up working there as nurses.  No big deal.  But then I keep hearing (constantly) about how Canadian nurses are flocking to the US and the reasons vary slightly but they ALWAYS contain more money. Chalk it up to personality differences but I'd rather sodomize myself daily with a roll of newspaper articles bemoaning Canadian ED wait times than have to look a patient (NOT a client, customer, or guest) in the eye and tell them I could no longer treat them because their coverage had run out and accounts recievable hospital policy says they have to leave.

That's what it comes down to for me.  If being a nurse means prioritizing money ahead of the patient's needs then I'm done....I'm out.

I will be the first to admit that I am naive about a great many things and this goes doubly for nursing.  What I always want and need is a little perspective, a little learnin'.  No better way to do that than asking questions and listening with your mouth closed.  Come at me!

Retarded

What do you think when you read that word? When you hear that word?  Do you immediately think of someone in particular or a group of people in particular?  Do you immediately scrutinize the person who said it and in what context they used the word?  Or, do you skip straight to judgment as this word is a strict no-fly zone and any usage, regardless of context or intent, is cause for immediate hostile rebuttal?

I'm finding more and more that people in the general public belong to the latter grouping and their reasoning is simple, clear, and beyond reproach: "They can't help it."

These are the exact words quoted to me today by an individual who has precious little in the way of life experience and perspective but has a wealth of personal opinion based on nothing more than his own life (what more do you need, really?)

I had made the 'verbal faux' pas while referring to the fact that this imbecile individual had spoken to me in a manner that is altogether unbecoming and undeserving of any human.  This person was quick to correct me and mention that I, "Shouldn't use that word because those people can't help it.

This has got me wondering, do I use this word flippantly?  I am well aware of the derogatory connotations associated with the word and am fairly certain I meant none of them in my usage (at this time or any other time).  When I used the word 'retarded' today, I was specifically referring to the fact that this person was treating me in a manner that suggested they thought that I was unable to comprehend their normal speech and that i had taken offense to their subsequent condescension.

I loathe avoiding controversy simply because everyone else does and I really don't believe I am using this word in a derogatory manner.  Perhaps I am in need of enlightenment. Perhaps I need to use another word; but, in any case, there exists the fact that people exist who are of lower intelligence and mental capacity than others just the same as there exist people who are of different ethnicities.  These characteristics are apparent and they are not inherently wrong.

I am thinking in circles now.  I can only say that I don't believe it is wrong to point out a distinction but it does become 'wrong' when you intend that distinction to suggest their inferiority/your superiority.

Any thoughts, moron?

Of Correlation and Regression

Is there a point in life where everyone feels that their life is going "according to plan"? Is there a certain point where everyone feels that life couldn't be further from the ideal than it is at that moment? Is there only a single time where either of these events occur? If statistics were the glasses with which we viewed our past, would we find that all of our lives fluctuate above or below the average, all eventually equaling zero? Or would we find that some finish with a strong positive correlation to the average life while others have had no relation whatsoever to that which truly equates "life"?

Something to break down this postulating mess is the language in which we interpret our lives, the standard by which we measure our current position and the standard by which we determine the scale of our position. With the subjectivity that is human understanding of the world around us, can there truly be a standard by which all things are counted?

There is.

Hidden somewhere between the implausible and the unbelievable lies the realization that in every pursuit that humankind has ever undertaken, there is commonality and, more importantly, the understanding that no new ground has ever been broken.

Someone was here before me.

Someone has a deeper understanding of the world I live in and no matter how far I perceive myself to have gone or how high I perceive myself to have risen, the answer remains the same. The playing field is not an unknown, the players within it do not contain unknown potential. The only unknown, if it can be described like this, is that which is known to you as such.

Applied to all facets of life, the only question that remains for myself and everyone who came before me and all those who will follow after is whether you can accept your insignificance.

1.6180339...and so on.