Consumers Should Have The Freedom To....
We, the people are Free to Choose,
but as consumers & patients only from the pallette
that we are allowed to choose from!
Freedom is only an illusion when others control what we can choose from and how those choices are administered. Here are some examples of how this control alters our right to choose:
Concern about Patient privacy issues came to the forefront when a series of articles exposed how some hospitals were disposing of patient charts in open dumpsters and how computer servers were electronically breached, revealing private health information. The ensuing government response was HIPPA. HIPPA set controls on how records are to be kept, but went much further. HIPPA, in effect, allowed your private medical records to be accessed and used by governmental agencies without your permission! Once that precedent was set of how they can access & use your medical records, fast forward a few years and NOW there is movement to allow the government to sell various edited parts of your electronic medical to 3rd party businesses without your consent.
A Stewardship Framework for 'Secondary Uses' of Electronically Collected Health Data
Medical disability claims is another example of how people are getting chewed up by a failing bureaucracy. The high rate of rejections of claims fueled by the aging baby boomer populations has backed up the courts ability to hear these cases. The back log is due to the lack of Administrative Law Judges. The government allocated the budget but, due to internal political conflict, only SIX instead of the dozens of judges were hired. A typical case takes about 1.5 to 2 years to be heard, during which time a disabled person is forced to sell off all of their assets to survive! Even if the government hired all of the judges that have already been budgeted for, it is estimated that it would take an additional 3 to 4 years for the back-log to be reduced. If you are one of these unfortunate people that have paid into Social Security all of your working life, how would you and your family survive? What is the real reason behind the administrations stall...is it to keep the budget for empire building?
Iatrogenic Medicine has become the number one greatest killer of Americans. "Death by Medicine" is the report on a meta-analysis study that demonstrates government approved "Conventional Medicine as Usual" was the cause of 783,986 unnecessary deaths annually, when all iatrogenic causes are combined. THIS MAKES CONVENTIONAL MEDICINE THE NUMBER ONE KILLER OF AMERICANS! If this is the number of reported iatrogenic incidents that ended in death, how many were not reported? How many more incidents occurred with detrimental effects to the patients that had outcomes less severe than death?
> I-at-ro-gen-ic: adj. Induced inadvertently by a physician or his treatment.
Death by Medicine - article with statistics
Medicle errors -
A White Paper on Safety and Choice with Integrative Medicine
State Licensing Boards have been given the responsibility for regulating health care, State by State. What have they been doing to protect us? You would think they would be researching, writing, indexing and publishing "Standards of Care," and developing safe guidelines for best, more effective, least expensive, and invasive practices of medicine, as prescribed by law. However, state licensing boards, including here in Connecticut, have frequently demonstrated their bias against practitioners who dare to offer an alternative or natural therapy to their patients, even where there has been no complaint or harm nor would it be likely that harm would occur from a non-invasive, natural therapy. Read this article about some of the Connecticut cases that demonstrate this abuse of Administrative power:
Turning the Tide: the Prosecution of Innovative Medicine
These initial thoughts I've had as a layperson are driven my experiences as health service consumer and a patient. For the past eleven years, I have had three episodes of a disabling malady that gave the symptoms of Chronic Fatigue, Fibromialgia, impaired mental clarity, and a fast bounding pulse that constantly felt like a base drum in my chest and ears. Conventional physicians prescribed a variety of drugs to palliate some of the symptoms. Unfortunately these drugs exacerbated my symptoms and caused additional symptoms, such uncontrollable hand tremors and involuntary ticks in my neck and limbs. Finally, during the third of the two-plus-year bouts with this illness that an MD, who practices an integrative approach to medicine, figured out the underlying dysfunction that was causing my disability. With environmental changes and a handful of supplements a day, I have almost returned to my prior level of healthy function without prescriptions. If I lose my access to supplements and vitamins and practitioners that can think outside the limited paradigm of matching drugs to symptoms, I very well may end up back on the road to being disabled again.
How did we get to this point where we have lost control of our healthcare? Originally medical practice was a cottage industry. The doctor tended to the families in proximity, in exchange for money or chickens or what ever. The doctor was respected as an important, critical member of the community. At some point, insurance companies intervened between patients and doctors, making agreements with doctors to keep their offices full while receiving a (large) piece of the fees. Meanwhile, the AMA carved off control of the CPT codes that are required for proper billing. Drug companies and big business all have their financial interests that they protect by lobbying the government and the FDA for essentially monopoly status. This results in more and more layers of regulation of healthcare, making it the MOST highly regulated industry. This pushes administrative costs even higher. Healthcare costs are spiraling out of control, with each group vying for control to grab more of huge profits, while patients are denied healthcare coverage and less expensive prescription and non-prescription alternatives.
Why does true free market medicine work better?
While this might be a simplistic view of very real issues, the situation were find ourselves in did not happen overnight. There is no easy fix... many Healthcare systems desperately need to be overhauled. These issues will not even be addressed until there is a strong consistent light on the powers that be that Americans are tired of the continuation of "business as usual." We can no longer fall prey to the illusion that what is being done is necessarily in our best interest. We must decide what it is truly for our welfare!
Accomplishments - American Association of Health Freedom
We need to become the stewards of our Healthcare system and not leave it up to "big-brother" government. As citizens, we can ensure oversight of what the government is doing by making our voice heard about what kind of healthcare system we want. While our time might be confined by our busy days, we can leverage our impact by supporting organizations that act as our Watchdogs. We can be kept apprised of what is occurring on the Healthcare front, at the state and national level. With concise information and effective tools, we can then respond accordingly to let our voices be heard and not allow OUR CHOICES be eroded!
FDA Bans Hormone Produced by Human Body as "Unapproved" Drug
