For some people eating is a constant battle. What causes people to have eating disorders? Women especially seem to be susceptible because they feel that they must be skinny like the models to be attractive. A popular reality TV show The Biggest Loser forces contestants to go through drastic life style changes to lose weight but also teaches how to eat healthy and how to set realistic goals. The success of shows like The Biggest Loser tells me something about America. Many Americans are over weight and scarily enough many who are not overweight believe themselves to be. Society pressures individuals to look a certain way or risk not meeting a mate or not being able to get a job. This causes pressures that we all know cause adolescents to develop eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia and binge eating. Now new research shows that women of all ages suffer from eating disorders and it seems to occur during major life changes such as puberty, going to college, post pregnancy and even when children move away from home. As stated in the article titled “When Eating Disorders Strike in Midlife”.
The article blames our “thin-obsessed” culture because friends, family and even doctors fail to realize that a persons physique as dangerously unhealthy. These pressures not only are affecting teenagers but women of all ages. The article explains that middle age women affected with these eating disorders seek out help on their own whilst teenagers must be coerced into treatment. Even with treatment eating disorders are difficult to recover from it seems as if the bigger issue here is how as a society can we reduce the amount of people who start down the road of an eating disorder? Should it be seen as more of a focus in health classes? Or as a society that predicates so much on looks are we too far gone to realistically be able to stem the tsunami of people suffering from eating disorders caused by the very values of our culture its self?
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
The Business of Health Care
The transformation of medicine into a profit driven business is a worrisome trend. Capitalism is beautiful in its simplicity and tends to be the most efficient way to allocate scarce resources dependent on the “invisible hand” of the market. But perhaps unfettered capitalism when it comes to the professions in the medical field is a recipe for disaster. Especially when we consider the thousands of people losing their jobs and with those jobs their health insurance. Doctors are being pressured to fluff up there billing such that insurance companies must spend more. They accomplish this through the use of tests that may not be entirely necessary to try to gain more money from the insurance companies to offset off set the thousands of Americans who have no coverage. This leads to higher insurance premiums.
It seems as if the current economic climate may be hitting the medical field harder then most experts have predicted. The old adage is that doctors have excellent job security because “ people will always get sick and need doctors”. Part of this is true; people will always get sick and need doctors. But what happens when the masses can’t afford the health care and those that can are fiscally sacrificed on the behalf of those who cannot pay the unreasonable cost of health insurance. Is it possible that in the current economic climate that medical care can become more about dollars and cents then that of patient care?
According to Dr. Sandeep Jauher recent pledges from the hospital, drug and insurance industry to keep the costs down will likely fail unless drastic changes in how the health industry is financed occur. As Dr. Jauher states “Doctors will not willfully cut their own income. Hospitals and individual doctors are having to aid those who have no insurance due to the economic down turn. So in order to pay for all these people without health insurance, doctors have to charge more and thus health insurance is costlier”.
It seems to me that some sort of restructuring of the health care industry is needed. Or perhaps in times of economic down turn there needs to be something more then unemployment so when times are tough people can still seek medical care that is affordable. The right to be healed of an ailment that can be easily treated should be a fundamental human right. Regardless of income level, how ever those who can pay for their health insurance should be able to without having to foot the bill on their insurance bill. Perhaps in times of economic down turn the country itself should spend more diligently and responsibly to ensure that although we may have to cut back on the extras we all can be happy and most important healthy.
“We have to ask ourselves whether medicine is to remain a humanitarian and respected profession or a new but depersonalized science in the service of prolonging life rather than diminishing human suffering”
- Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
It seems as if the current economic climate may be hitting the medical field harder then most experts have predicted. The old adage is that doctors have excellent job security because “ people will always get sick and need doctors”. Part of this is true; people will always get sick and need doctors. But what happens when the masses can’t afford the health care and those that can are fiscally sacrificed on the behalf of those who cannot pay the unreasonable cost of health insurance. Is it possible that in the current economic climate that medical care can become more about dollars and cents then that of patient care?
According to Dr. Sandeep Jauher recent pledges from the hospital, drug and insurance industry to keep the costs down will likely fail unless drastic changes in how the health industry is financed occur. As Dr. Jauher states “Doctors will not willfully cut their own income. Hospitals and individual doctors are having to aid those who have no insurance due to the economic down turn. So in order to pay for all these people without health insurance, doctors have to charge more and thus health insurance is costlier”.
It seems to me that some sort of restructuring of the health care industry is needed. Or perhaps in times of economic down turn there needs to be something more then unemployment so when times are tough people can still seek medical care that is affordable. The right to be healed of an ailment that can be easily treated should be a fundamental human right. Regardless of income level, how ever those who can pay for their health insurance should be able to without having to foot the bill on their insurance bill. Perhaps in times of economic down turn the country itself should spend more diligently and responsibly to ensure that although we may have to cut back on the extras we all can be happy and most important healthy.
“We have to ask ourselves whether medicine is to remain a humanitarian and respected profession or a new but depersonalized science in the service of prolonging life rather than diminishing human suffering”
- Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
