heart attack victim refuses air ambulance because she had no health insurance

[IADEMO2004]

http://www.omaha.com/article/20100804/NEWS01/708049903/0#uninsured-she-refuses-chopper

Omaha World Herald

cut

When she thought it came to facing a pile of hospital bills or perhaps the Grim Reaper, Linda Field chose the latter.

Worried about how she would pay for treatment with no health insurance, she refused a medical helicopter ride to a hospital — even though a nurse and paramedics had restarted her fragile heart twice.

Field, 51, of Nehawka, Neb., collapsed Saturday night at a street dance in Union, Neb. A nurse who was at the dance cared for her until an ambulance arrived.

Field said she told the paramedics, “I can't get in a helicopter and go to the hospital because I don't have insurance.

end cut


Missouri should have read this before they voted yesterday.

[KT2000]

1. I would probably do the same

in her situation.
Where I live the helicopter is $8,000 - then the hospital costs.
People who have been through this describe how the hospital prepares a budget for the person to pay for the bill. Barely surviving and not much living in what is left over.

[myrna minx]

2. .

:-(

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. I've said it before, and I will repeat it

I am blessed that where I practiced EMS we didn't charge. That said, the few times I had to explain to a patient that they needed medical care, and they fought it on economic grounds... they were American Tourists...

I remember this kid who was complaining of neck pain after crash. He didn't want us to even touch him, due to the cost. I finally talked him down and onto full C-SPINE precs, and took him to the hospital... good thing, he had some neck damage that needed ahem a more permanent solution. And to this day the forty five minutes it took still give me chills.

But hey, we got the best medical system in the world... as long as you can afford it.

[MattBaggins]

4. Wonder what the age skew was for the votes in Missouri?

How many people on Medicare voted to "protect" themselves from "that thar gawd damned government healthcare."


This is one of the issues that has my blood boiling. IF YOU VOTE AGAINST, OR FOR THE REPEAL OF, HEALTH CARE; THEN PLEASE RIP UP YOUR GOD DAMNED MEDICARE CARDS YOU FUCKING HYPOCRITES.

[eridani]

8. And how many voted to reject mandates to buy a crappy product with a high deductible?

If she were a "Bronze Person," she still wouldn't be able to afford the helicopter.

[malaise]

5. Please send this to Keith Olbermann

Still shaking head.

[IADEMO2004]

6. Done

[femrap]

7. Along with the

DNR requests, maybe we should just add KMN (Kill Me Now).

Eventually some people will not be willing to bankrupt their families and will prefer Assisted Suicide. Why give the Big Med one's last cent and still be facing a death sentence?