Heart enlargement diagnosis/implications

[Alison_Leighfield]

Judy,

I guess they tied in the allergy scratching with SM scratching and the sprain with limb weekness etc.
Thats the reason I re-visited the vets practice to ask why we hadn't been refered to a neuro but at that time they hadn't heard of SM so when I told and informed them about it they got a little funny and asked me to leave, on reflection perhaps they realised that they themselves made the error.

I hound them now, always dropping in leaflets with Cavalier info etc, LOL.

It just makes you extra carefull to be sure to read the small print of all policies.

Alison, Wilts, UK.

[rory]

There ought to be national health for pets. Maintaining health should not be a profiteering enterprise. IMO.

Oh, please, no. I will leave the profession (that i haven't even entered) it if becomes a form-filling, HMO run system like human medicine where I am told what I can and cannot do because someone else (insurance) is paying for it.

[Karlin]

But the HMO is a purely for-profit enterprise and has nothing to do with National Health systems as are available in every other Western democracy except the US, and much of the rest of the world too! National health systems are quite different. Not perfect by any means, but a far better health system than that of private care and HMOs in the US. My father, who was Canadian but was a prof of medicine at Stanford and UCDavis, has argued all his life for a national health system in the US to remove the inequities by which people are held captive to their employers to get health insurance, charged ever-increasing premiums if they aren't covered by employers, and are dumped dumped out of the system if they don;t have it. He argued for this before Congress and wrote to presidents supporting this direction. A key reason I do not feel I could return to the US is the health system -- I do not want to be dependent on an employer for health care!

Right now I can go to the hospital here for treatment in ER and I will be charged under $15 for the visit. All my health care is covered, whatever happens to me, for all my life on the national health scheme though I carry insurance (at much lower cost than the US and at a flat rate) to get upgraded care -- eg a private room when I had surgery a few years ago, and immediate treatment rather than being wait-listed (the latter is the worst aspect of national health schemes and in many countires doesn;t apply. I get more choice thru insurance -- but I'd prefer to pay more taxes for a better national health system. Unfortunately in the UK and especially Ireland there are waiting lists for many procedures if you don;t also have insurance). If I travel anywhere in the EU I am also covered to be cared for under their national health programmes.

My father taught his interns and residents in a huge county hospital that got the poor, the derelict, those with no insurance. Regularly, other hospitals would refuse to treat them no matter how ill they were. That made national health a campaign for him all his life, *especially* after the advent of that insurance company delight, the HMO. I truly believe the US will implode under the weight of an increasingly elderly population with no health insurance. Those older voters will likely be the eventual force of change -- the thought of needing procedures you cannot possibly afford and the end of the job-for-life will mean reform of the existing healthcare system or a widening gap between those who have, and those who do not. Basic healthcare should be a right, not a purchased privelege.

Ok off the soapbox now! Though must add I do not agree that vet care should be nationalised, though I think it should be subsidised in some cases, especially spay/neuter.

And Judy just wanted to say I am delighted for you.

[judy]

Oh, please, no. I will leave the profession (that i haven't even entered) it if becomes a form-filling, HMO run system like human medicine where I am told what I can and cannot do because someone else (insurance) is paying for it.

I'm with you on that, that's not what i'm advocating. i'm advocating for a system where insurance companies don't have the power to exclude conditions. How many pets are euthanized simply because owners can't afford the medical bills for life saving treatment or preventive care?

It bothers me that illness conditions are excluded from affordable coverage, but i can't blame the insurance companies, they are in business to make the biggest possible profit they can make. If the law will allow them to refuse to cover the care that an animal needs most, i can't blame them for taking advantage of that. It's not like their highest priority is health care, it's making money.

I would rather remove profit making interests from control over health care allocation and delivery, and have people who prioritize health care rather than profit maximization in control, people who have nothing to gain from denying care.

As for national health, most (not all) Canadian patients and doctors whose comments I've heard express approval for the Canadian system of national health. There are better and worse examples of such an approach to health care delivery. My Japanese friend spoke very highly of the Japanese national health care system, she was very appreciative of it. She was treated for stomach cancer which she eventually died of, but she experienced the system over several years and had only good things to say about it. I don't know how Japanese doctors feel about it.