◆ SpookStack

\TAL TOTHE TIME WE FINALLY | Because Sympathetic doctors who H ‘know me pulled certain strings, - . this ts without an operation or any 7 prescribed an X-ray appoint- lars for the X-ray, andagaineash , ’ ghd sped to the hospital. The doc- | _ morning the space might be gone. - ee AT 2 ARTE ORT EES - fn advance (I alse found out It . \would be another eleven Collars ° _ - Iwhen I came back to get the phy- sician’s report on the X-ray re- jsults), I stormed out after a dig ~ shouting match and never hadthe X-rays taken, ; nae For # simple cough, treatment was to be at least $38, not count- ing another $5 for medication ” prescribed and probably another $5 more the second time I Saw the physician, So there !t is, $50 for * @ cough, about $2500 for hepatitis, -$1000-$10,000 for an operati ~~ and, well, it’s a good thing they” don’t charge those poor bastards for heart transplants, , "PROM THE TIME HE OR, DERED ME INTO THE HOSPI- LOCATED A BED TOOK SIk DAYS, He told me ofa fellow doc- tor who had a heartattack patient who waited three days before Space could. be found In a hospi- mically high cost of medicine in this country and you can see that when the doctor looks up from his desk and tells you hospitalization is required, shooting yourself might, in the [long run, prove less painful, That is, of course, if you haven’t read ‘«The High Cost of Dying.” _ The strange part about this - mess is that if you are really poor you are not too bad off, That is if you live in New York or one of a dozen or So other states that have a welfare program that en~ titles you to full medical treat- ment, These states also have a Medicaid program that provides relatively complete care if you are under 21 or over 65 years of Finally another doctor friend — ‘of mine located a bed In Albert Einstein Hospital in the Bronx, and I was bundled up at 1:00 a.m. ae eee tor feared that if I waited until | Let’s turn now to the finances. | 1 am going to escape this mess financially clean, Otherwise this . treatment would cost somewhere in the neighburhood of $2,500 and medication, There is a kid cown the hall with an unusual blood ailment that has hospitalized him for two “months, When he is through, his cost, which his pa- rents must pay, will run in the acighborhood of $15,000. ' A month ago, I had a rasping cough and went to the clinic at St. Vincent’s Hospital. It was eleven dollars to seeaphysictan, and an hour and a half wait. He Medicare program for persons lover 65. “plying with complicated forms and delays that can take up to six months. Stl, public hospitals are _ fastastically understaffed abd . overcrowded. In addition, few hospitals make attempts toreach out into the community and the poor are reluctant to go toa hos- ritarian, paternalistic, and White, , Then there are the various health insurance plans whfch range in cost from $200-$400 per year and again have restrictions as to the limit in terms of type and length of care, but will cover “most conditions, ? 1. Without any of these three deals “going for you, anduniess you have ‘ millHons or your -brother {s 2 | doctor, you have s hell of a pro- ; - blem if you get serlously UL ; ‘ There {is some light shining st ment that, because of a crowded t Schedule, was three weeks from that date. When I showed up, the, ' hospital demanded sixteen dol- > ; the end of the tunnel, There is. . some pressure building up and . from the most unlikely of ail sources— from : ; themselves, - During the civil rights move- . | ment in the South In 1964, there arose a group of doctors callzc the Medical Committee on Haman . yRights, They organized ptysi- 2. a clans and medical students to go South, They relied chiefly oa ft- " JO -"was unheard of in the annals of wwe: Aomanetann mndiaion, Thle Sven te Nee Couple this with the astrono- going home and age and make Jess than 52360 pers year, Then there is the federal . These programs dorequire ap- 7 pital which fs excessively autho-“: the. doctors — . * e nancing from other physiclans. It§ : . later expanded its work intonor- | thern.ghettos and even picketed , an AMA convention in New York, _. asking that physicians become ‘ Amore cognizant of the problems ‘ _ “af the poor and the Blacks In par- ticular, and also demanding that the AMA prohibit racial discrl- _ mination in the staffing of hospl- " tals, - : ! . The Medical Committee on Hu- * man Rights in accordance with the ' general temper of the movement ‘fn 1964 and 1965 was extremely i tberal in its programs and de- | mands, Things have changed ra- - @ically and “We Shall Overcome” ‘Ras given way to “The Streets Belong tothe People.” The young- er more militant Student Health Organization fs growing in medi{- eal schools around the country. SHO chapters in a number of schools are pushing for greater student power in school policy. Groups at Staniord University, ‘ Southern California School of Me- , Gicine, University of California at San Francisco Health Science Center, and Albert Einstein Col- fege of Medicine have managed to involve an unusually large number of students andhave even won some reform:, There is, however, a group of Medical students and young phy- Bicians that finds SHO rathe* mild, This new breed of radical students, iniernists, and resi. dents is to a great extent unor- ganized and thelr actions areau- tonomous and independent, WHILE IN THE HOSPITAL, I HAVE BEEN VISITED BY SOME OF THE NEW REBELS, THE FIRST TWO, I THOUGHT TO BE THE HOSPITAL ODD-BALLS. WHEN THE NUMBER ROSS TO 1 TWENTY-FIVE, [{ WAS CON- ; VINCED SOME SORT OF RE- : BELLION WAS TAKING PLACE, : Currently, there {s 2 protest ac- ‘tion going on at Jacobi Hospital (also serviced by Albert Etn- stein Medical School} right - across the courtyard. A week ago, three pediatric residents began giving their pa- tients notes acvising them nat to pay their hospital bills and urging them to begin community agita- tion over the cutbacks in the Medicaid program, ‘The hosplta! administration ' ordered the rebels suspended but « found Itself met with resistance, The head of the Pediatrics Unit 1 Féfused to suspend the phys!- ' fans, In addition, 2 pititior of \ support was circulatedand twenty > out of thirty. fellow pediatric re- |: Sidents stated that, In effect, the : three physicians facing suspen- Sion were acting for all of them. and if they were suspended, th: other twenty would resign. } - -f The administration as of nov, . . has held off any action fearing‘a ¢ Palace revolt, The movement ~" bound to snowball. Already more , (Continued on Page 6)