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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsCA Rural hospital closed, some have accepted they may die in emergency
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-06-06/madera-county-rural-hospital-closure-some-residents-brace-for-deathThis rural California county lost its only hospital, leaving residents with dire healthcare choices
MADERA, Calif. It was dinnertime when Sabrina Baker, a mother of six, felt the familiar twinge of contractions.
At first, she brushed it off as Braxton Hicks, false labor pains not uncommon in the late stages of pregnancy. But after dinner that night in early January, the pain sharpened and radiated to her back. The contractions intensified, and Baker knew this baby girl was coming fast.
She had a decision to make and the options werent good.
Two days earlier, Madera Countys only general hospital had shut its doors. The abrupt closure of Madera Community Hospital and its affiliated medical clinics capped years of financial turmoil. Still, most residents in this rural county in Californias geographic center were caught off guard, unaware of just how much was at stake until their hospital was gone.
Baker knew she couldnt make it to the next closest hospital, in Fresno, a roughly 45-minute drive.
Twenty-five minutes after the first contraction and two pushes later, she delivered her daughter, alone, on her tan love seat. The baby was breech, which upped the anguish and the risk during delivery. When it was over, Baker tied the umbilical cord with new shoelaces and wrapped Onax in a San Francisco 49ers blanket. An ambulance rolled up 20 minutes later to take mom and baby to the hospital.
I mean, Im lucky, Baker said, standing outside her home in a swath of Madera County surrounded by cropland and almond groves. We could have died.
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Madera Community Hospital shut its doors and by March had filed for bankruptcy.
Residents were anxious. Many dont have cars and worried about how they would get to hospitals in other counties. Longer wait times at those remote emergency departments meant they would miss the work and pay they need to survive.
niyad
(112,435 posts)NowISeetheLight
(3,941 posts)After working in hospital revenue cycle at the upper mgmt level I can honestly say our healthcare system is completely broken. We spend twice what other industrialized nations do per patient, have worse outcomes and don't cover anyone. All to pad the profits of insurance companies, pharmaceutical , for profit healthcare and device manufacturers.
They claim the extra we pay is to promote innovation and invention, yet drug companies spend twice on advertising what they do on research.
We have insurance companies flying people in India for joint replacements, great hospital care, rehab, including a companion, for weeks. They offer the patients no copay or deductible if they go. Then they come home and it's still cheaper than an overnight surgery here where they go home with limited aftercare. It's a joke... a sick joke.
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/21/health/21abroad.html
riverbendviewgal
(4,251 posts)Not allowed. Watching american ads on american stations is astounding at all the warningd.
gratuitous
(82,849 posts)Heavy advertisements for a product you can't buy, that might kill you or do you serious injury, and that is micro-targeted for a very small percentage of the population. For example, Skyrizi is a drug to treat moderate to severe plaque psoriasis, a condition that affects fewer than 10 million people in the country (about 3%). But a viewer can't make it through an evening without seeing at least one extended ad (1 minute or longer) for it during prime time.
But Merck is suing to stop the federal government from negotiating prescription drug prices.
jimfields33
(15,473 posts)Saved the hospital with grants from the state at least until they could financially do it.
niyad
(112,435 posts)BlueWaveNeverEnd
(7,537 posts)niyad
(112,435 posts)BlueWaveNeverEnd
(7,537 posts)from the article:
onecaliberal
(32,489 posts)vanlassie
(5,637 posts)Especially for emergencies. But Id bet lots of Madera folks use Fresno hospitals anyway. The 45 minute statement is very exaggerated. (However, 40 years ago I chose to drive from Fresno to Visalia, which IS 45 minutes, to give birth in a progressive small hospital.
onecaliberal
(32,489 posts)And they should get to have a hospital in Madera. People are dying because its not open.
vanlassie
(5,637 posts)something I agree about. It can harm the case.
BlueWaveNeverEnd
(7,537 posts)Johnny2X2X
(18,745 posts)Small town clinics and urgent care centers save lives, but they aren't profit centers so they're being closed across the country.
roamer65
(36,739 posts)In Ontario, the province keeps the rural ones open because its not about profit.
Its about delivering health care.
Sky Jewels
(6,862 posts)patphil
(6,035 posts)The area around Madera may be rural, but a city of that size needs to have a hospital. I think the state should intervene and get the hospital reopened under new management.
Snooper9
(484 posts)Is there some new thing where people just throw some scrabble letters up and see what lands LOL
Sky Jewels
(6,862 posts)For-profit healthcare is a crime. We need universal, government-provided care. No insurance middleman are needed.
(Yes, yes, I know ... "not all" rural people vote red ..., etc., etc. My heart goes out to the Democrats and progressives amongst them.)