Curable cancer treatment - no insurance

[mockturtle]

Bri, I agree.&nbsp; We do have excellent medical equipment and procedures in this country but our health care system operates as an 'industry' and, though I consider myself a political conservative, I've always felt that health care should be available to all and should not be profit-driven.&nbsp; <br /><br />I could write a book, though, on the amount of waste billed to Medicare and Medicaid that would never pass muster with a private insurance company.&nbsp; If the feds cover everyone, the waste and fraud will rise exponentially because they are incapable of oversight.&nbsp; There are no really easy answers.&nbsp; I volunteer for a free walk-in clinic that serves the uninsured [actually, we're just in the process of opening] but can do little else.&nbsp; <br /><br />To the OP--there are always ways of getting your treatment paid for.&nbsp; Sometimes the pharmaceutical companies foot the bill for those who cannot pay.&nbsp; It's not as bleak as it seems.&nbsp; God bless!

 

[Guest]

Have I told you lately that I love you, mockturtle<img src="/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" align="absmiddle" border="0" />....thanks for that. <br /><br />I have no idea what the answers are and it is a crying shame that it has become a political football.<br /><br />I know people from all over the world and I have never heard one complain about their medical services in a country that has "care for all". Their mouths drop open if you tell them about our system. They ask: "why do you put up with it?"<br /><br />Hugs,<br />Bri<br /><br />

 

[josephusminimus]

Jack,<br />Thanks for your words.&nbsp; I'm way past trying to convince anyone of anything.&nbsp; I find my time better spent on my studies.&nbsp; However, I will post info, and probably unnecessarily my opinion.&nbsp; Which follows below:<br /><br />The trouble with applying the western science research model to herbs, whether you are looking at Eastern or Western traditions, is that to create a study, you have to know what you are testing.&nbsp; To do that, most tests extract the active chemical in the herb and even out the doses.&nbsp; Then they apply that to the test subjects and see what happens.&nbsp; Herbs are much more complex things than that, and by extracting only part and manipulating the levels of that, you end up with misleading results.<br /><br />An easy example of this principle is the flower Foxglove.&nbsp; From which we get the medicine Digitalis.&nbsp; You cannot take too much Foxglove before the other constituents in it make you violently ill.&nbsp; I.E. you throw it up before you can OD on it.&nbsp; Digitalis, the western medicine equivalent, however, will kill you if you are wrong on the dose.&nbsp; We've seen this again and again with herbs like Comfrey and others.&nbsp; It is in Western medical hospitals that 33% of the patients who die are killed by the cure, the chemical medicine that they are given.&nbsp; And that is a statistic from watchdog groups from within the hospital industry.&nbsp; I am not saying that all of Western medicine is evil, but we have been conditioned by the greed and marketing manipulation of the corporate to worship doctors like high priests, and chemistry like small miracles.<br /><br />I simply rather think the small miracles are the weeds that grow in your lawn that will cure your gout or arthritis (assuming you haven't dumped more chemicals on them!) <br /><br />OK - opining subsiding.&nbsp; LOL!!

<br /><br />Heck, those of us who've survived cancer thus far probably won't continue all that long if something else doesn't get us first.&nbsp; Those of us who are burning up the medical resources available because we're old and our bodies are failing, filling the hospitals and making the medicos wealthier mightn't see it as a choice, but it is.&nbsp; We can choose not to do it.<br /><br />My particular choice is to find whatever alternatives I can so's not to contribute to the black hole for money [medicare, medicaid, medical insurance] traditional medical care's becoming as the population ages.&nbsp; <br /><br />Trying to squeeze a few more years out of this life while laying the cost of it on the workforce, what's left of it, doesn't make a lot of sense to me.&nbsp; A few trips in for heart surgery or taking 3-4 years to die of medico cancer treatments can cost more in medical care than most of us made during our entire working lives.&nbsp; Or some significant portion of what we made and spent living our lives.<br /><br />Mine's been a life I wouldn't swap in any way for the life of anyone else.&nbsp; It's still good, but it can't last forever, no matter how willing I might be to spend other peoples money trying to keep it going.

 

[mockturtle]

<span id="post_message_1275258967">filling the hospitals and making the medicos wealthier</span>

<br /><br />I can assure you that physicians are not getting rich off Medicare patients.

 

[Coffee Tim]

I recall a DR in Joplin, Mo. making a statement a few years ago.&nbsp; She said "We don't have a healthcare system we have a disease treatment system."&nbsp; How right she was.&nbsp;

 

[josephusminimus]

<span id="post_message_1275258967">filling the hospitals and making the medicos wealthier</span>

<br /><br />I can assure you that physicians are not getting rich off Medicare patients.

They must be getting rich off something else, then, instead.&nbsp; But whatever they're getting rich off of, what I said remains.

 

[mockturtle]

You're right, Ann.&nbsp; And those making the biggest bucks from the health care 'industry' are not doctors.&nbsp;

 

[Coffee Tim]

Well said Ann, I agree with you on that.

 

[offroad]

Bri - powerful words from a survivor. great for you!!

Ann - Needs to be said. Also truth.

 

[josephusminimus]

I have to comment on this. A doctor gets "rich" because he/she worked hard in high school, four years in undergrad school, four years in medical school, four years minimum in residency (80+ hours a week for those four years), that's twelve years of study!! and finishes with over $250,000 in debt. And you people complain because they earn good money??? I think they deserve every dime they earn. Some treat patients for free. Do any of you work for free while trying to pay off a quarter of a million dollars or more in student loans? They're treating people who oftentimes bring on their own health issues with poor diet, obesity, smoking, alcohol/drug abuse, and other poor choices. They show up at the clinic and ask for a pill that will negate their own bad decisions, then get angry at the doctor. Ann

<br /><br />There's a grain of truth in every stereotype.&nbsp; I don't know the statistics, but I'd be surprised if the overwhelming percentage of doctors don't come from wealthy, or well-to-do homes and enjoy a lot of financial support to offset the $250,000 cost of schooling you refer to as 'debt'.<br /><br />But of the many who get that education in public universities where the much of the cost of the educational process is paid for by taxpayers.&nbsp; Debt, or no debt, they can reliably plan on being millionaires in a decade of practice.<br /><br />They've got a great union, positive PR, and enough control on their profession to keep out the riffraff by husbanding the number of medical school graduates carefully.&nbsp; Whatever percentage of the huge profits of the medical industry they share, there'd be more of them and the price of their services would be reduced if there were more of them.<br /><br />Nothing wrong with that.&nbsp; Just proves what everyone knows:&nbsp; A strong union drives up the cost of labor.&nbsp; If a union is strong enough the union members can be assured of affluence and sufficient financial surplus to make certain their progeny have a better shot at wealth.<br /><br />No surprises in any of that, and no stereotypes.

 

[mockturtle]

A sizable percentage [26.3% per 2005 data] of physicians in this country now are foreign born and many of our doctors are closing their practices early.&nbsp; If the profession was as lucrative as you say, this would not be the case.&nbsp; The physicians in my family financed their education by jobs and loans.&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><br />Many <em>non-profit</em> CEOs actually make over $1M/year and other hospital executives often make $300K or more per year.&nbsp; Pharmaceuticals, medical supplies, sophisticated radiology equipment and increased demand and expectation for all of the above help to drive costs higher.&nbsp; <br /><br />There are lots of places to point the finger of blame.&nbsp; We as individuals are also responsible as we often never question the necessity of tests, scans or treatments ordered and some are obviously ordered as <em>CYA measures</em>.&nbsp; Personally, I only consent to about half of the recommended tests ordered at my annual visit.

 

[josephusminimus]

A sizable percentage [26.3% per 2005 data] of physicians in this country now are foreign born and many of our doctors are closing their practices early.&nbsp; If the profession was as lucrative as you say, this would not be the case.&nbsp; The physicians in my family financed their education by jobs and loans.&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><br />Many <em>non-profit</em> CEOs actually make over $1M/year and other hospital executives often make $300K or more per year.&nbsp; Pharmaceuticals, medical supplies, sophisticated radiology equipment and increased demand and expectation for all of the above help to drive costs higher.&nbsp; <br /><br />There are lots of places to point the finger of blame.&nbsp; We as individuals are also responsible as we often never question the necessity of tests, scans or treatments ordered and some are obviously ordered as <em>CYA measures</em>.&nbsp; Personally, I only consent to about half of the recommended tests ordered at my annual visit.

<br /><br />I don't believe it's accurate to summarize the way my part of this discussion began as 'pointing fingers of blame'.&nbsp; I certainly never intended to imply physician earnings carry the burden for medical care being as expensive as it is in this country.&nbsp; If I did imply it, I misrepresented my actual thoughts on the matter.<br /><br />Having said that, however, I'll also say physicians and physician earnings aren't exempt from scrutiny or mention simply because of the size of the earnings of other professionals within the same system.&nbsp; <br /><br />You and I can't know why

<em>'many of our doctors are closing their practices early'</em>

.&nbsp; Maybe it's because they made so much and invested the surplus so successfully they no longer have to do it.&nbsp; In which case, an argument could be made the high pay actually is destructive to the delivery of medical care here.<br /><br />Whatever the reason for closing the practices early they almost certainly aren't flipping hamburgers instead of being doctors.&nbsp; And it's reasonable to assume the reason the country draws so many foreign physicians can be found in their desire to do whatever doctors who closed their practices early are doing.<br /><br />Seems to me every facet of the health care/medical care infrastructure here could be termed 'expensive', and that the causes could fill an encyclopedia.&nbsp; And certainly the expectations and complacency of the citizenry promulgated partly because of medical insurance is a piece of it.&nbsp;<br /><br />Self-destructive behaviors, on the other hand, help kill off the patients early and probably have a long-term salubrious consequence to the system in terms of&nbsp;long term costs.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br /><br />The earlier people die, from a strictly&nbsp;practical perspective, the lower the likelihood they'll be&nbsp;needing health care they can't afford.&nbsp; <img src="/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" align="absMiddle" border="0" />&nbsp; <br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

 

[yesican]

Doctors are like people...all are individuals--some greedy, some compassionate, some good, some not...I've seen all kinds.&nbsp;<br />&nbsp;&nbsp; What the problem is, is not the doctors, its the laws passed by our congress who have been bribed by those willing to give to their campaigns that keep them in office.&nbsp; Like the ripples in a pond, the effects of one little stone&nbsp;(law) can affect the whole pond (people).&nbsp; There is seldom a good effect from laws passed because of greed.&nbsp; Law requiring mandates have made it horribly expensive for hospitals to operate (same with schools).&nbsp;<br />&nbsp; In other words...don't blame healthcare cost on those providing it; blame on the government who dictates how those cares are to be doled out.<br />&nbsp;Rae

 

[angeli]

Hmmmm..... I don't remember casting blame on doctors as persons.&nbsp; My comment that mentioned them referred to our tendency to want others to give us that 'magic pill' and to worship doctors as high priests rather than taking responsibility for our own health.<br /><br />I'm not sure who 'you people' is.&nbsp; And I'm not sure that it is effective to blame the patients for their lack of health either.&nbsp; Certainly just as there are individual doctors, each patient is individual.<br /><br />My beef, if you need to call it that, is with the pharmaceutical industry and the corrupt practices it represents.&nbsp; I can say that and still acknowledge that there are plenty of good and useful chemical drugs. I also mentioned the study done by the Hospital Association watchdog group that describes the large number of patients who die from the side effects of the medicine they were taking.<br /><br />AND tried to disseminate a few herbal facts at the same time.<br /><br />I do find the following quote to be a bit disturbingly cynical, especially followed by a smiley face.... <br /><br />

<span id="post_message_1275267690">Self-destructive behaviors, on the other hand, <strong>help kill off</strong> the patients early and probably have a <strong> long-term salubrious consequence</strong> to the system in terms of&nbsp;long term costs.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br />The earlier people die, from a strictly&nbsp;practical perspective, the lower the likelihood they'll be&nbsp;needing health care they can't afford.&nbsp; <img src="/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" align="absMiddle" border="0" /> </span>

<br /><br />Not trying to be argumentative, but it seems that we've strayed away from the compassionate healing perspective, perhaps as modern medicine has as well.

 

[josephusminimus]

Hmmmm..... I don't remember casting blame on doctors as persons.&nbsp; My comment that mentioned them referred to our tendency to want others to give us that 'magic pill' and to worship doctors as high priests rather than taking responsibility for our own health.<br /><br />I'm not sure who 'you people' is.&nbsp; And I'm not sure that it is effective to blame the patients for their lack of health either.&nbsp; Certainly just as there are individual doctors, each patient is individual.<br /><br />My beef, if you need to call it that, is with the pharmaceutical industry and the corrupt practices it represents.&nbsp; I can say that and still acknowledge that there are plenty of good and useful chemical drugs. I also mentioned the study done by the Hospital Association watchdog group that describes the large number of patients who die from the side effects of the medicine they were taking.<br /><br />AND tried to disseminate a few herbal facts at the same time.<br /><br />I do find the following quote to be a bit disturbingly cynical, especially followed by a smiley face.... <br /><br />

<span id="post_message_1275267690">Self-destructive behaviors, on the other hand, <strong>help kill off</strong> the patients early and probably have a <strong>long-term salubrious consequence</strong> to the system in terms of&nbsp;long term costs.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br />The earlier people die, from a strictly&nbsp;practical perspective, the lower the likelihood they'll be&nbsp;needing health care they can't afford.&nbsp; <img src="/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" align="absMiddle" border="0" /> </span>

<br /><br />Not trying to be argumentative, but it seems that we've strayed away from the compassionate healing perspective, perhaps as modern medicine has as well.

<br /><br />Angeli:&nbsp; A map of the thread drift here would reveal it was abraded by channels and tributaries beginning almost immediately after posting and it's continued then from now with the drift being the primary flow.<br /><br />I don't go to doctors, don't use health care systems, haven't for a quarter-century and of the two prescription drugs I use, one's now over the counter [Prilosec], the other a blood pressure med prescribed so long ago I don't recall what medico prescribed it.&nbsp; I buy them at pharmacias in Mexico, or off the web from India because I can get them at a tiny fraction of the price this side of the border, and I don't have to pay a physician to write me a prescription.<br /><br />It's been described as a self-destructive behavior by various US physicians of my acquaintance, along with others who worship in the tower of US Health Care and its priesthood.<br /><br />I got where I am by being denied medical insurance because of a pre-existing, expensive to treat condition when I&nbsp;applied for a policy after changing jobs.&nbsp; Decided to learn about the alternatives, studied long and hard on herbs and minerals, and discovered there's a significant sub culture of others with similar experiences who've found their way there, share information.<br /><br />What you've labelled cynicism, in my life is realism.<br /><br />But I'm not evangelical about it.<br />&nbsp;

 

[angeli]

Not trying to offend you, Jack.<br /><br />I just have a difficult time with comments that take human life so lightly and, yes, cynically.&nbsp; But each to their own.<br /><br />You are right about the delta of discussion!<br /><br />I've been an Eastern medicine patient since my 20s when I started martial arts.&nbsp; recently I've had to use Western medicine doctors as I'm in an area (hopefully temporary) in which there are quite literally no alternatives except my own herbal knowledge.&nbsp; The difference to my system is quite literally shocking, for sure.

 

[VanLifeCrisis]

I know its kind of anecdotal but i know two people who are living years beyond doctor expectation with cancer after they began taking e<span class="l">ssiac</span> tea and no other treatments.

 

[josephusminimus]

I know its kind of anecdotal but i know two people who are living years beyond doctor expectation with cancer after they began taking e<span class="l">ssiac</span> tea and no other treatments.

Plenty of similar anecdotes from the Essiac or the four herbs it's made from, online or offline.

 

[Guest]

My experience here, not a lot of supposition a..."Just the facts, Ma'am!" LOL well maybe a little opinion too...haha<br /><br />My young but brilliant urologist ...(that oddly enough I put my trust in, instead of an internet wrangler or self-styled "healer" who took a weekend workshop on herbal medicine) gave me the good advice to go ahead and try alternative medicine but report to her anything I am taking since many "herbal cures" do little but mask the markers for a particular disease, allowing the actual disease to spread, metastasize and morph into a more invasive form. In my case, mask the actual PSA count and allow the cancer to invade the bones or lungs as a different form that has less or no markers. How many have died, thinking they have "cured" cancer??? Who knows, they aren't here to say.<br /><br />As I said, I couldn't see or feel what it did if anything. My suspicion is that if you are obsessed by what you eat and drink and treat yourself with kid gloves and take a regimen of herbal immune system builders, you may stay healthy as a horse....I didn't do that but instead lived a robust and wild, wacked out crazy life and slid into home a bit ragged and worse for the wear and would not trade one moment of it for something less enjoyable.<br /><br />Your choice...<br /><br />I chose medicine instead of home or folk medicine and you sometimes find yourself at a crossroads of decision. If you can't afford medicine, which many can't here in our advanced society, you go with what you can afford. <br /><br />When my friends ask me what I did with my situation, I tell them and if they are asking, I strongly suggest the proven science, but that is just me....I take science over myth and rumor every time....it has proven well to me and I am at 68, alive, feel great and am pretty damn well and many of my peers aren't. I have lost four men friends in the last couple of years from prostate cancer (you know, the kind they say won't kill you until you are dead by something else in your 80's...and no, don't bother having your PSA checked...bullsh-t! is what this old man sez!) <br /><br />I am 12 years, nearly 13 out from a diagnosis and while I still have it, I take a little white pill every day that gives me a few small side effects that are just irritating (nothing any woman in menopause wouldn't recognize) and I have the best years going on of my entire life ...thank you modern medicine and pharmacology!<br /><br />Just my experience and opinion...and of course, as usual YMMV...<br />Bri

 

[josephusminimus]

My experience here, not a lot of supposition a..."Just the facts, Ma'am!" LOL well maybe a little opinion too...haha&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;My young but brilliant urologist ...(that oddly enough I put my trust in, instead of an internet wrangler or self-styled "healer" who took a weekend workshop on herbal medicine) gave me the good advice to go ahead and try alternative medicine but report to her anything I am taking since many "herbal cures" do little but mask the markers for a particular disease, allowing the actual disease to spread, metastasize and morph into a more invasive form. In my case, mask the actual PSA count and allow the cancer to invade the bones or lungs as a different form that has less or no markers. How many have died, thinking they have "cured" cancer??? Who knows, they aren't here to say.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;As I said, I couldn't see or feel what it did if anything. My suspicion is that if you are obsessed by what you eat and drink and treat yourself with kid gloves and take a regimen of herbal immune system builders, you may stay healthy as a horse....I didn't do that but instead lived a robust and wild, wacked out crazy life and slid into home a bit ragged and worse for the wear and would not trade one moment of it for something less enjoyable.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Your choice...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I chose medicine instead of home or folk medicine and you sometimes find yourself at a crossroads of decision. If you can't afford medicine, which many can't here in our advanced society, you go with what you can afford. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;When my friends ask me what I did with my situation, I tell them and if they are asking, I strongly suggest the proven science, but that is just me....I take science over myth and rumor every time....it has proven well to me and I am at 68, alive, feel great and am pretty damn well and many of my peers aren't. I have lost four men friends in the last couple of years from prostate cancer (you know, the kind they say won't kill you until you are dead by something else in your 80's...and no, don't bother having your PSA checked...bullsh-t! is what this old man sez!) &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I am 12 years, nearly 13 out from a diagnosis and while I still have it, I take a little white pill every day that gives me a few small side effects that are just irritating (nothing any woman in menopause wouldn't recognize) and I have the best years going on of my entire life ...thank you modern medicine and pharmacology!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Just my experience and opinion...and of course, as usual YMMV...&lt;br /&gt;Bri

<br />It ain't as though anyone's attempting to talk you out of what you believe, question the body of experience you based your opinions on, nor even talk down to you about any of it.&nbsp; A lot of people naturally agree with you, some being physicians, some calling themselves scientists, most doing as you've done and finding satisfaction in believing what you base your belief on is science.<br /><br />No harm in that, certainly.&nbsp; No reason anyone should feel the need to change your views in any way, feel superior to you for holding different views and dealing with your issues differently than they'd deal with theirs.<br /><br />Science is just a method of observation, testing, hypothesizing about the results of the testing, revising the hypothesis, testing again, observing, hypothesizing again.&nbsp; Most intelligent people do it to one degree or another, most without any letters behind their names.<br /><br />Your observations are the result of your own use of the scientific method.&nbsp; And they're as thorough as the great body of other products of the scientific method we bring into our lives.<br /><br />The scientific method doesn't rely on people who memorized what other people tested and observed.&nbsp; Anyone can do it.