Abusing the system, pointing out the obvious, am I a racist?

[Ridryder 911]

Welcome to medicine. You are correct by your observations, just the facts.. not racism. That is why I quit working in ER full time, got tired of pampering those who did not need to be there and not having room for those needed it.

It is called responsibility for one self. Wow ! A new concept, although some of our Northern friends don't believe that each person should be held accountable for individual action, and allow the government take care of you.

Look at it this way, why should anyone leave the 'system"? The average medicaid recipient has benefits approximately $28K a year (medical, dental, pharmacy, and food benefits). This is far more than most working class salary. Approximately >85% of the patients I see in ER, have no private insurance, but are assigned state medicaid with a primary physician (PCP), and approximately out of those 75% do not see that physician because "they would have to wait"... of course these are the same people that complain of waiting >1 hr in a ER. They know they have to be seen, no matter how trivial the matter. It is the same ones who "do not have money for Tylenol" but have 3 packs of cigarettes in the purse.

So what do we do ? We develop MORE programs, new housing (which a new apartment complex was destroyed in < 30 days), give programs to educate at technical schools and then PAY them to go as well... of course, some purposely fail, to re-enter the system again. So what have we accomplished?... A group of socialized dependent retards. It is our fault for making them this way... becoming dependent on a government, or any subsidy is not healthy.. emotionally, physically, or socially. Now, not all take advantage of the system, there are some honorable ones that do need a hand-up, but these are very few and rare.

It has been proven through out the years, welfare and medicaid systems fail. Unfortunately the ones that need it such as the truly emotional & physically disabled, as well as those that do need the hand-up not hand out, will no longer be assisted rightfully the system will be broke. Laziness, greed, has taken advantage of the system and broke it.

Sorry, life is a bear...no one promised you a rose garden and everything in life is free. You have to work hard, bust your ass once in a while to get ahead... Quit whining!... especially for those that are physically capable of working. It should not be my responsibility or any company for paying your way, or nor am I going to feel sorry for you as well. Get a job.. flip some burgers, get a Pella grant go to school.. do something except have someone else take care of you!

R/r 911

[timdog88]

Hey, thbarnes, I know this is off topic, but do you work in Atlanta, and if so, who do you work for. There is a good chance that I will be moving there in the near future, and anything you could share about ems in atl would be appreciated.

BTW..if anyone ever tells me that they called 911 so the "wouldnt have to wait"..i tell the ER and 99% of the time they go straight to triage..in a sick way..it makes me happy..am I bad?

[medik8]

Wow....come do some rides with me....you think you're fed up now? LMFAO....

Hey...it's all good....no sense in getting your panties all in a bunch. You're not gonna change the ways of the abusers, or where they come from.

Do I agree with it? No... But, it's a pattern, and it will keep repeating itself... :roll:

xoxo

Luv, 8

[medic001918]

Wow....come do some rides with me....you think you're fed up now? LMFAO....

Hey...it's all good....no sense in getting your panties all in a bunch. You're not gonna change the ways of the abusers, or where they come from.

Do I agree with it? No... But, it's a pattern, and it will keep repeating itself... :roll:

xoxo

Luv, 8

+1. No sense if losing sleep or getting bothered by something that you can't change in the first place. As much as I dislike these calls, they are part of the job. The nice thing is that they can often times be turned around very quickly and get you back into service. Pick your battles, and this one wouldn't be worth fighting in my opinion. As 8 mentioned, patterns repeat themselves.

Shane

NREMT-P

[hammerpcp]

I am not sure it was a good idea to post this in the manner you did, th. I don't get the impression you dislike a person based on their race, but there is a distasteful tinge to the way you approached this subject- nothing blatant, just not necessarily a good idea. The fact that you are sharing your experiences and frustration is fine, but there are plenty of people from every race that do not have the necessary life skills to effectively help themselves. Personally, I think a discussion on how to approach the subject of the abuse or misuse of the system is a good subject, but there was no need to mention race. Socio-economic issues are where the problem will likely be found, regardless of race. Mabye vs was a little harsh, but I can see his reaction being a common one.

Personally, I feel that life skills are not taught enough in schools. Public education is trying to teach people from all walks of life and in doing so should be able to assist those persons who do not have a good background or parents that are able to educate their children in the proper way to deal with their healthcare or even how to balance a checkbook. The failing of current education is the fact that the basic cognitive methods are taught, but little instruction is given on why the information is important or how it applies to everyday life.

=D> Well said. I absolutely agree on all accounts. My eyes are burning.

[Jess]

Everyone makes a good point. I have elderly patients who tell me they don't have enough money for food and meds, so they have to choose which is more important. Then I have welfare recepients who have more gold jewlery and a nicer car than i do handing me a medicaid card demanding transport by ambulance for a cough because they think they will get seen faster. (I love taking them to triage) That's what makes me mad. The goverment treats our elderly and vets like crap but give the illegals and welfare cases everything. I'm sorry they can't keep their legs closed and have 10 kids. Can you say manditory sterilization!

Wow! I agree with every last bit of that! The thing that pisses me off the most is when my father died a year ago, I lost insurance because he carried it on all of us kids. I was 19 when that happend. so busting my ass working 2 jobs one at Walmart and one at a hotel, i was not eligible for insurance. so what i did is was went to the public assistance building and went through the whole mess to try and get some. I have a lot of health problems with my heart and digestive system and was doing well going to my follow up appointments with my doctors to get it taken care of. but when i lost insurance i was no longer able to do so. so anyway back to the public aide. i went to the public aide office and sat there for hours just to find out, they cant help me because they have to combine all the income of everyone living in the house. well, it was my brother, me and my mother and her friend and her friends son. we lived with them cuz we were homeless at the time. so yeah i got denied for assistance. but what really pissed me off is there was a Mexican women and her 12 children that got approved! The kicker of it all? she ADMITTED flat out right there that her and her children were illegals!! SO here I am busing my ass STILL at the age of 20 with no insurance and a 2 major things wrong with me that can and will kill me. I just dont think it's fair at all. these people have free health coverage and free everything and dont even use it but yet i cant get a little bit of help. something needs to be done to stop this mess of people abusing the system.

[brock8024]

This subject makes me mad. I hate it when people come in and know the more kids they have the more free money they get. I worked in a ER and one of our ladies that does the admitting almost got fired one night. A woman came in with her kid who had been sick for a week( btw the kid was playing) and the admitting clerk asked for her insurance cards. and the woman was like here is my FREE insurance. The clerk looked at here was like it is not free it cost me and every other tax payer money. She filed a complaint and the admitting clerk got writen up.

I have even seen patients who called a ambulance came to our er and went to triage and then called another ambulance from our waiting room to go to another er. Why cause they had to wait. It is a sad world we live in. I mean no one takes care of themselves.

As far as it goes we are in this to care for people. When u get mad at one of these people just think of all the others u help. One of my fav calls are the little old ladies that just want someone to talk too. to me that makes everything else better. Just think of someone u get to help and forget about the rest. we are here to help people not judge them.

Brock

[brock8024]

One more thing, people are here complaining about these people, but are they doing anything to help the problem. There has to be something u can do in ur community, wherether it is going to schools and trying to teach kids stuff through ur ems or vol at free clinics or something. It is funny it is like the person who @#&$^ about the president when they did not vote. same here stop #%@$* unless you are trying to do something to fix or help the problem.

Brock

i know this is going to make people mad and i am sorry up front.

[Spock]

WOW! Tough subject with no right or wrong answer. Personal responsibility is important and perhaps lacking here but a little bit of compassion would be in order. I used to be very critical of smokers until I saw the reimbursement for a thoracotomy for lung CA. Changed my tune pretty quick not to mention how fun and challenging are these cases. It's called job security so smoke 'em if you got 'em!

Live long and prosper.

Spock

[Just Plain Ruff]

First off stop internalizing about something you cannot control nor will be able to control with all the education in the world.

You cannot get upset over something that has been going on since I have been a medic and it was around long before I became a medic and that was in 1992.

it's been around forever, back in the 1800's people couldn't pay their bills so they paid with a chicken or a pig or the doctor relied on the goodness of the community to pay for his services. If one person couldn't pay then the whole community would band together and pay the doctor in some fashion - sounds like the early version of medicaid or public assistance

In the 1900's we began to see charities and public entities running hospitals and they didn't get paid very often. They usually relied on the goodness of strangers and people who supported their hospitals. It was a community thing again like the 1800's

Pre-1800 most people either suffered thru the sickness or they died.

The problems continued thruout the 1900s up to this day.

So you see the problem has been around for hundreds of years but it has just received much more press and more notice like you and me.

I agree there has to be more education in the schools, more education all together. There is no easy fix to this, there is also no way around the fact that we have the drains on the system that you so aptly pointed out in your original post.