It’s been more than a month since I first complained to my Group Health Cooperative medical team about increased pain. It’s been more than two weeks since my doctor diagnosed the problem and said I “may actually need to have a reconstruction of the jaw with bone and tissue from my leg, called a fibular free flap”.
I lived in pain all this time, hoping that help will come soon. But because nearly every step of my treatment needs to be approved and agreed on due to restrictions of my insurance plan, there are way too many people involved. And they are all human, they forget things, get distracted, rely on others, etc. Several times, after waiting for someone to contact me about an MRI or a CT scan, I couldn’t tolerate the pain and called my doctor. Only to find out that I myself should have contacted such and such people at such and such department… Why didn’t they tell me about it from the beginning? Things seem to be moving only if I keep pushing my health providers and remind them about myself.
The only help I received so far was pain killer prescriptions. But even pills no longer help, and I cannot eat or drink. I cannot even talk because now I am having spasms that practically paralyze my face.
I wonder if British, French or Canadian citizens are humiliated by their healthcare systems as much as we are here, in the richest country on earth?
