--Steven Nissan, MD
This quote comes from the book "At Peace: Choosing a Good Death After a Long Life" by Samuel Harrington, MD. It discusses at length the over-treatment, over-testing and over-medicating that is rampant with folks over 65. It is a very empowering book about making conscious decisions about how one lives out the later years.
In October 2019, I was scheduled for a much-needed hip replacement. I asked one too many questions via email of the surgeon, whereupon he decided that I was a bad patient and refused to do the procedure. I questioned the need for a very high-dollar drug used after surgery to avoid blood clots. Fearing that I would damage his income by refusing the expensive drug, he cancelled on me, stating it was because "I wouldn't follow his directions." Long story short--I found a surgeon who used baby aspirin for the anti-clotting precaution, and one year later, I had an extremely successful surgery and quick recovery. I was a model patient 😉 And I had experienced Dr. Nissan's quote above first-hand.
I don't have any brilliant suggestions to fix our broken U.S. medical system. It is completely motivated by insurance, legalities and greed, and the patient's needs are quite far "down the list." It's a sad state given the amount of money spent on "health care."
Leta
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