Thoughts on Health

I’ve been thinking about how our society deals with illness a lot lately. Maybe it is because of the National Health Care Bill or maybe it is because I have a dear, dear, friend with a terminal illness, or maybe it is because my grandmother is 103 years old and we, her family, are trying to keep her safe, comfortable, and well taken care of in her own home for as long as possible.

My friend, Roy, was scheduled to retire at the end of the month. He hired his replacement and was eagerly looking forward to the transition and training process. Two weeks before he was to pass the baton he began sleeping all of the time. Four days after his trainee arrived Roy was diagnosed with the worst possible brain cancer, underwent surgery, has been non-responsive since, and will enter Hospice Care this week. Through it all he has had a cadre of his sisters and nieces at his I.C.U. bedside tenderly caring for him. There are nurses, and doctors, and aides, but his family has been by his side through this unexpected and devastating illness. They have taken time off from their jobs and/or flown in from around the country to be with Roy. One niece, when thinking of long-term care, commented, “We are all just working people, I don’t know how we will continue to do this.” But so far they are managing. How they will manage the gazillion dollar hospital bill is yet to be seen.

My grandmother is in good health, she is just old and tired. At 103 her mind is sound, but her body is weak. Every step she takes behind her wheeled walker is an effort and a risk of a possible fall. I found her, uninjured, on her bedroom floor the last time she fell and it broke my heart to think she had been lying there waiting on my rescue. She has one of those “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” buttons around her neck, but was so shaken she forgot to summon help. Now the family is wondering how to increase her level of home care. An assisted living facility, or in my grandmother’s vernacular, an old folk’s home, is not an option for us at this point. My grandmother has been quite opinionated and vocal about her feelings toward nursing homes for over half a century. Moving her from the home she has lived in for also a half a century would certainly kill her.

Like Roy’s family, we are just working people and/or are spread out all over the country. One of my aunts is already a nearly full time caregiver with my uncle and me serving as backup after our full time jobs. Hiring a stranger to stay with grandmother is an expensive and unpleasant option. Once again, it will be the family stepping up and stepping in to offer the care and love my grandmother needs at the end of her years. I don’t know how we will do it – but, like Roy’s family, we will find a way. My grandmother is fond of saying, “It’s a good thing I had ten children, now it is payback time.”

How do those without family make it through an illness or through old age? I’ve seen first hand the devastation of a prolonged hospital stay, first with my mother’s long bout with lung cancer and more recently when I had pancreatitis and gall bladder surgery. A patient needs an advocate, someone to make sure they get the right medications, a bath, and decent, compassionate care. Without family by one’s side it is next to impossible to traverse our health care system alone.

I’ve not mentioned the expense of health care or the expense and necessity of health insurance. These are issues currently dividing our country. I have good health insurance coverage, paid for by my employer; the rest of my family is not so fortunate – the rest of America is not so fortunate. How we treat our infirm and our elderly is an indicator of how we rate as a society – Roy’s family gets good marks, my family gets good marks. I am afraid for those without family, friends, or the financial resources to look after them in their time of sickness. Thank you President Obama for looking out for those without access to adequate health care – it is the right thing to do, for everyone, especially us working folks.