How to begin. When I married at age 41, I just assumed that my wife would outlive me. That's just the way Nature intended it. Women usually live longer than men. My mother outlived my father and my wife's mother outlived her husband. I was a bit concerned that my wife's weight might lead to heart problems, but she had regular checkups and her heart is strong. The doctor's never seemed to be concerned with her weight.
About two and a half years ago, my wife, Alma, started experiencing severe back pain. She went to a chiropractor several times, but the pain just got worse. She finally went to see a doctor about it. X-rays and CT scans were done and it was discovered that she had a fractured vertebra which had compressed. A procedure called kyphoplasty was performed to lift the compressed bone and fill it with cement. This should have alleviated the pain, but she remained in agony. More tests revealed more fractured and compressed vertebrae and another kyphoplasty was done. And then, another. Finally, the doctors decided to do a battery of tests and they found that she was severely anemic; absolutely no iron in her blood. More tests were ordered, and even with pretty good medical insurance, the hospital and doctor bills began to mount.
Alma was finally diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood. She had almost no bone marrow by the time the cancer was diagnosed. The orthopedic surgeon had to to into her hip bone to find enough marrow for a biopsy.
Only a few years ago, the prognosis for those with multiple myeloma was three to five years. There still is no cure, but real progress has been made in treatment for the disease. But treatment is very expensive and insurance doesn't cover nearly enough for those whose incomes are pretty meager to begin with. Alma was making pretty good money working for a software company in customer support. I had worked for the same company for four years, but got laid off when the company was sold and I was working part-time for a non-profit.
Suddenly, Alma couldn't work any more and the insurance for both of us was about to be canceled. The non-profit for which I work found a way to give me another part-time position which gave me full-time hours and benefits, including insurance. That insurance takes half my paycheck every two weeks to cover Alma. We got her covered without any lapse, so they couldn't deny her because of preexisting condition. However, when she began the procedure to get approval for her treatment, which included chemotherapy and transplants of her own stem cells, the insurer told her she had to wait one year. No exceptions, and too bad if you die while you're waiting. She finally found a sympathetic ear at the insurance company who helped her get an exception to the rule. Reminding her that there are HIPPA rules that might apply in this situation and a very strong and active insurance commission in this state may have expedited the matter.
Alma spent the whole summer of 2007 undergoing treatment at the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance. We took her there during the Memorial Day weekend and she didn't come home until after Labor Day. The cancer was put into remission, but it will come back. Her immune system is completely compromised and even catching a cold, which for most of us is an inconvenience for a few days, can make her ill for weeks. She's had pneumonia a couple of times. The worst thing was contracting shingles this past winter. She was in agonizing pain for months. The only drug that seemed to help was Lyrica, and the insurance company didn't want to pay for it. They finally relented after her pain specialist wrote them a letter explaining that Lyrica was the only medication that gave her relief and didn't make her even sicker.
I came home a couple of days ago to find that Alma had been crying all afternoon. The local hospital where she has been getting treatment had turned her account over to a collection agency. Now, she has been working with the hospital to make arrangements for getting the fees reduced and to make monthly payments. She thought it was all under control, but it seems the billing department at the hospital doesn't communicate very well within its own walls. To use an old cliché, the right hand doesn't always know what the left hand is doing. Of course the collection agency isn't being very helpful. After all, they get paid a percentage of everything they collect.
Alma will be getting another CT scan Monday morning. The doctors saw something in her chest x-rays after her last bout of pneumonia that made them want to check for lymphoma. It seems that pneumonia in multiple myeloma sufferers can lead to lymphoma.
Sometimes I wonder if we weren't all better off before all these diagnostic test were devised. We got sick and we either go better or we didn't. Something kills us all eventually. About three weeks ago, I was getting out of my car and found myself in a lot of pain. I could barely stand up and my lower back hurt like hell. I went to work the next morning, but by the afternoon, I knew I needed to see a doctor, so I went to an urgent care clinic I'd been to before. The clinic was recently purchased by one of the local hospitals (not the one my wife is in hock to). It used to be that you could get into and out of that clinic in a pretty reasonable time when it was privately owned. I spent nearly three hours in the waiting room and then another hour-and-a-half in a cold examining room waiting to see a doctor. When the doctor finally did come in, he asked me a few questions, poked and prodded a little and had a tech draw some blood and had me pee in a plastic cup. He then prescribed a muscle relaxant and pain killer and sent me on my merry way.
I suffered through the weekend with terrible back pain and decided to go back to the clinic instead of to work Monday morning. There was another long wait in the waiting room and examining room, even though I was the second patient through the door that morning (they don't take appointments now that the hospital has taken over). This time, I saw a registered nurse practitioner who spent a little more time with me and ordered x-rays and gave me a prescription for the anti-inflammatory drug naproxin (which the doctor should have done on my previous visit). He said he saw what might be kidney stones and suggested I schedule a CT scan and make an appointment with a urologist who zapped a large stone a little over three years ago.
I had the scan and a week later, I saw the urologist, who wondered exactly why the clinic had suggested I have a CT scan and see him. He said there was nothing there for him to treat. Well, I guess I could have told him what had just dawned on me. Medicine is big business nowadays. A CT scan, even that isn't necessary, makes money for the hospital. He made money by having me pee in another plastic cup , stick his gloved finger up my rectum and talk to me for about 10 minutes. Every time a doctor orders up another test for my wife, somebody makes money. We have gone through bankruptcy and incalculable stress over how to pay all the co-pays and deductibles and still keep a roof over our heads and food in the pantry. My wife now qualifies for Medicare because she's on disability, but we found out that, because of coverage “donuts” getting her prescriptions through Medicare will be prohibitively expensive. So, I continue giving up half my pay to keep her insured.
I know the conservative element out there hates to hear this, but we need affordable, comprehensive health care coverage in this country. Quite frankly, I don't think I can afford to outlive my wife. But I probably will and that's not the way Nature intended it to be.
