Re: OT...Democrats Care About The Health Of Americans!

On Wed, 15 Jul 2009 20:08:51 -0500, Lone Haranguer
<linuszrv@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

stan.birch@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
The Canadian system may not be absolutely perfect; but IMO, at least in
urban centres, it is about as good as it gets!

Oh bull***. I've met enough Canadians with gripes about their health
care that I know better.

If I were a Canadian citizen living in Canada, I couldn't get the tests
in 12 months that I got here within a few days.
I was scheduled for my annual checkup on June 25th and my personal
physician (that I've had over 25 years) recommended an MRI before the
appointment.
Got that on June 19th. My doctor reviewed it on June 25th and suggested
I see a neurosurgeon about a tumor on a vertebrae.
Got an appointment on July 10th and after seeing the neurosurgeon an
appointment for a total body bone scan on the 13th. Got the results
today.

In a day or two I expect to have an early appointment for surgery.
****************
"Despite government promises and the billions of dollars funneled into
the Canadian health-care system, the average patient waited more than 18
weeks in 2007 between seeing their family doctor and receiving the
surgery or treatment they required," said Nadeem Esmail, director of
Health System Performance Studies at the Fraser Institute and co-author
of the 17th annual edition of Waiting Your Turn: Hospital Waiting Lists
in Canada.

"It's becoming clearer that Canada's current health-care system cannot
meet the needs of Canadians in a timely and efficient manner, unless you
consider access to a waiting list timely and efficient," Esmail added.

Ontario recorded the shortest waiting time overall (the wait between
visiting a general practitioner and receiving treatment) at 15.0 weeks,
followed by British Columbia (19.0 weeks) and Quebec (19.4 weeks).
Saskatchewan (27.2 weeks), New Brunswick (25.2 weeks) and Nova Scotia
(24.8 weeks) recorded the longest waits in Canada.
****************
British Columbians wait average of 84 days for MRI: report
Last Updated: Wednesday, January 16, 2008 | 6:21 AM PT
CBC News

B.C. patients wait an average of 84 days after seeing a specialist for
an MRI scan under the public health care system ? twice as long as
Ontarians ? a national study says.
***************
As a footnote on Canada, the average wait for a simple MRI is three
months. In Manitoba, the median wait for neurosurgery is 15.2 months.
For chemotherapy in Saskatchewan, patients can expect to be in line for
10 weeks. At last report, 10,000 breast cancer patients who waited an
average of two months for post-operation radiation treatments have filed
a class action lawsuit against Quebec?s hospitals.
*******************
Efforts to reduce wait times for MRI have focused on increasing the
number of diagnostic imaging devices, as Canada lags far behind other
countries in this regard. For instance, Japan and the United States have
35.3 and 19.5 MRI units per million population, respectively, whereas
Canada has only 4.6.
**************************
That is right down the list for Google finds when "Canada wait for an
mri" is entered in the search box.

I suggest you have Canadians stop publishing their findings if you want
to keep your miserable wait statistics a secret.
LZ

Nobody is arguing Canada could use more MRI machines. Ask any MRI
salesman.

What yo are ignoring is that we already have way more than we need. If
I needed one I can get one same day. You probably could too. Half of
Canada can to as they live in one of a half dozen large metro areas.
The other half lives far enough out in the boonies that nobody expects
them to have that level of access in any country. We have more folks
in large metro areas than Canada and less than in Europe. OTOH we have
under used capacity almost everywhere we have machines so the wait
should not change.

BTW - as I understand it the major waits in this country are not a
capacity problem. It is the for profit hospitals pushing the poor
patients into the charity hospitals. That should change if everybody
has insurance. The people tha tshould be scared are the Medical sales
folks as a better usage model should cut sales.
.