Hi Karin

[Guest guest]

With due respect, Karin, your limited view of the US healthcare

system only addresses the area closest to the Canadian border:

America is a HUGE country and I live in the far west, California and

I will tell you that we have the BEST medicine here in the

country ... in fact we are proud to be the home of three top medical

teaching hospitals, namely, Stanford, UCSF and Berkeley. My

daughter went to Berkeley and in mentoring as a predmed student at

Stanford. It is true that our public hospital ER and trauma

departments are filled to the brim with mostly poor and shall I say

this, immigrants, all of whom get FREE services!!! You see, we have

a means test here, the middle class working " poor " often are the

people left out of the mix and these are the people you hear the

hard luck sad stories about. I believe that the US needs to have

some sort of socialized medicine for all BUT with some sort of

system where it cannot be abused. Hence, it has taken so long for

America to sign on for this type of socialized medicine. To get the

best healthcare one needs to have a job [which also eliminates the

preconditions we all have] America is run like a business; you work

hard then you are rewarded. Corporate America pays the healthcare

premiums for their employees. After age 65 the government kicks in

with healthcare monies to help pay for whatever insurance you have

or don't have, including drugs. Bush is a terrible president who

has done very little in the way of helping the country socially, he

has been too concerned with war! He offered a drug program for the

65 and over crowd and it is a joke!! Canada opened its arms to

these folks who have bought drugs off the internet and if they live

near you guys then they merely cross the border. It is mostly for

drugs they do this!! I am a member of an excellent health

maintainance organization [HMO] there are several in the country and

it is like a giant clinic attached to their own hospitals and

specialists and it can take just hours or days to get an

appointment! The times I have been taken ill I get in immediately

and having now four specialists each actually emails me regularly to

make sure I'm doing OK. How's that for service? So don't be

knocking the US system ... yeah there are lots of faults but I

certainly wouldn't want to live in Canada thank you! A girl at work

used to live in Canada and she told me of horror stories like the

ones I hear on this site. All good intentions but unless you are

lucky like Liz to pin down a good group of doctors, you are in

a very sorry situation. I imagine it is ditto in Australia too.

Both countries have strong British ties and copy-cat healthcare

systems which are an absolute disaster in England right now!!

Sorry, don't mean to go on but I am quietly reading these posts and

have to protest....

Janet in California

> >

> > If this is the case why has the Ontario has to send some cancer

> patients to Buffalo, New York for their treatment? When the NICU at

> Sunnybrook.was closed due to an outbreak of MRSA infants were sent

to

> the US for care.

> >

> > People are willing to sell their homes and most everything

else to

> get to the US for care. Several fo my nurses used to work in the US

> and they tell me the care was so much better. One woman took her

> husband from Nova Scotia to the US for cancer treatments and he had

> five extra years with his children. These were quality years that

he

> would not have had, had he remained in Canada. The family was told

> that nothing more could be done, but yet American doctors blessed

him

> with five extra years of health and life.

> >

> > Our healthcare system is awful and I'd give anything to move to

> the US for medical care alone. I have received care in American

> hospitals and its been so much better and much more efficient than

> care I've received in Toronto or Halifax or Saskatoon. Not to

mention

> a wasted trip to Montreal - my GP never even received a letter. If

> Respirologsits in Canada would actually be helpful than I'd have

> something great to say about Canadian healthcare. Honestly, if it

were

> not for my family doctor and infectious disease specialist I'd be

> dead. That's about the only positive thing that I do have to offer

> about my care.

> >

> > Hugs, :0)

> > LIz

> >

> >

>