Important

A dear friend sent me the information and link below today. I had not heard of it before, but I find it even more so important today than yesterday. Once you have read this, I will tell you why I think it’s important.

From a nurse:
I'll never forget the look in my patients' eyes when I had to tell them they had to go home with the drains, new exercises and no breast.

I remember begging the doctors to keep these women in the hospital longer, only to hear that they would, but their hands were tied by the insurance companies. So there I sat with my patients, giving them the instructions they needed to take care of themselves, knowing full well they didn't grasp half of what I was saying, because the glazed, hopeless, frightened look spoke louder than the quiet 'Thank you' they muttered.

A mastectomy is when a woman's breast is removed in order to remove cancerous breast cells/tissue. If you know anyone who has had a Mastectomy, you may know that there is a lot of discomfort and pain afterwards. Insurance companies are trying to make mastectomies an outpatient procedure. Let's give women the chance to recover properly in the hospital for 2 days after surgery. It takes 2 seconds to do this and is very important. Please take the time and do it! Please send this to everyone in your address book. If there was ever a time when our voices and choices should be heard, this is one of those times.

If you're receiving this, it's because I think you will take the 30 seconds to vote on this issue and send it on to others you know who will do the same. There's a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act which will require insurance companies to cover a minimum 48-hour hospital stay for patients undergoing a mastectomy. It's about eliminating the drive-through' Mastectomy where women are forced to go home just a few hours after surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from anesthesia and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached.

Lifetime Television has put this bill on their Web page with a petition to drive to show support. Last year over half the House signed on. PLEASE!! Sign the petition by clicking on the web site below. You need not give more than your name, state, and zip code.

http://www.mylifetime.com/community/my-lifetime-commitment/breast-cancer/petition/breast-cancer-petition

Recently, my company changed insurance companies to save money and to continue to offer not only premium health insurance to their employees and their families but to add extra insurance coverage for the benfit of their employees. I contacted the new insurance company and was assured that I would still be offered the same excellent coverage as provided before. That said, this Friday when I went to the hospital for my chemotherapy, getting my normal intravenous feel bad drugs and my dreaded horse pill chemo drugs. My wonderful new insurance company paid for my chemo pills, however stated that I could no longer be able to get the drugs from this facility any more.

Horrifying, yes! For just a moment in time as the clocks stops, you lean over the counter and look down at a computer printout that states the same thing you just heard from your pharmacists voice. You've just had intravenous chemotherapy in the fake leather green supposedly comfy hospital chair and you feel like shit. You stand there thinking to yourself - where do I go, what do I do, my drugs, my drugs - are they - the insurance companies going to kill me instead of the cancer. You come out of the fog, and nod yes to the pharmacist that you understand this and sign the paper giving you a prescription costing a mere $2,548. You panic and wonder where you will get these dreaded horse pills now and fear that they will be tacking another huge cost to your huge mountain of hospital bills. You know that you'll be calling the insurance company on Monday and hope that this is all just a mistake and you move on.

At the moment, I am not up to publishing much of my continued writing efforts. Much of what I write today is…… I can not quite say just yet. I am trying to find my voice and hopefully it will speak out ever so loud as before.

But the above petition is important. Insurance companies seem to control our very destinies these days. I still suffer from horrible, extreme nerve pain due to my mastectomy and will continue to go through several more rounds of chemotherapy. I hope you will take the time to speak out in a voice ever so loud.