I'm finally reading some of the reports by people who listened to the Ø press conference. I agree with everyone who pointed out that it was interesting, but not in a good way, that the president knows all about the first openly gay pro-basketball player, but still seems to know nothing about the Kermit Gosnell trial, or even what is going on about Bengazi.
Should the media really be happy that the president cares more about American Idol type crap than the country's security?
But even worse is being told that Obamacare has already done marvelous things for my family.
Bullshit.
Our primary plan was dropped by my employer, so we're left with Tricare. (As far as I can tell, every single person who works where I do who has Tricare ended up dropping the employer provided Aetna plan this year, since the Cadillac(?) plan isn't financially worthwhile for us when it costs us twice as much, and still doesn't cover a lot of the things Tricare doesn't, and may be taxed at 40% next year anyway.)
I've had to fill out more stupid paperwork so that my doctors could show "meaningful use" of their EHRs. And somehow meaningful use has my doctor asking all sorts of questions for government databases which I don't think the government has any right or need to know. My ortho gives me nice printouts of what happened at the appointment, and every single one tells me that I need to look at the Healthy Weight and You guidelines. I know I'm overweight, and they do, and they never mention it at the appointment, because except for my knees, none of my other health markers show any negatives due to my weight, but the damn form is required to have that on there because my weight and height aren't in preferred parameters.
On a side note, I'd really prefer if my physician could spend the majority of his or her time during my visit paying attention to me rather than a computer. Supposedly once they get used to the program it will be easier, but I haven't noticed any improvement, even in the practices we use which have had EHRs the longest.
And every doctor asks the same questions, over and over, and over. I had knee surgery a few weeks back, and had to fill out three different forms in two days, each of which asked me about previous surgeries and what meds I'm taking. By the time I got to the last one, I just wrote, "see previous forms". This is *all* in the hospital database by now, since that's where I've had every surgery in the last 13 years except for my cataracts. Their system knows it, so why in hell do they have to ask me again, every single time? Am I suddenly going to have had a new surgery five years ago between a surgery four years ago and today? And the meds. I've told the doctor, I've told the hospital, I've told the anesthetist, each on a separate form, but aren't they all supposed to be talking to each other so I don't have to do this anymore?
At least, for right now, I don't have to worry about trying to find a plan on the non-existent exchange, for only 9.5% of our family gross income. I realized today that the feds don't take into account the cost of living differences between locations when they decided how much a family could afford to pay for insurance. $75K for a family of four doesn't go anywhere near as far in CT as it would in OK, but each family is considered able to afford the same amount for health care.
I think that right now, to do my bit for improving my health, I am going to play some mindless computer games and try to lower my blood pressure without medication.
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