My Girlfriend will get her meds. And all without my calling out the man who made it happen.

[MADem]

408. This has been discussed on this board dozens of times down the years, even before ACA.

Anytime a new system rolls out, there are things to learn. MEDICARE isn't terribly transparent, either. You have to do your homework, no matter what system you're playing with.

Perhaps you don't realize that the National Health in Great Britain doesn't cover all medications, and it doesn't cover all surgical procedures, either?

They'll give you what THEY think you need to solve your issues, but if you want the next step, the "better option," you have to pay out of pocket for it. Or find a charity to help.

Here's an example of what I am talking about. There is a hospital in Saint Louis, MO that does a specialized surgical procedure called Selective Dorsal Rhizotomy on children with spastic cerebral palsy. It stops the agony of the spasticity and helps the children have a much improved quality of life. NHS rarely does this operation, only in the last two years have they expanded availability, their technique is OLD and out-of-date, and they still can't treat all the kids that need it to improve their quality of life. They prefer to give the children drugs to loosen up the twisting muscles in their leg as opposed to this permanent, surgical solution.

In Saint Louis, they've done the operation on HUNDREDS of children from UK, Ireland and other nations with "national health" schemes. The parents save money or hold charity fundraisers to get the money --sixty to eighty thousand dollars for the operation and follow-on care. They do this because the only other option NHS gives them is to drug their kid or just watch the child suffer. I can direct you to links if you doubt my word on this.

Bottom line--NO system is perfect. No system is intuitive. No system is simple. Nowadays, we have a thing called the internet, where we can look things up, find things out, even ask for help in a place like DU. Anyone with a high school, never mind a university, education knows enough to do this. Surely a college grad who ostensibly makes a living doing research to write articles can figure this kind of thing out. I am just not buying the "Clueless Will" portrait you are painting.

Will got some incredibly horrible advice from a so-called expert who was a friend, so he said, and I don't think he even approached the doctor about the issue, so he wasn't "turned down" on that score, either. When he came here to DU, he learned about the "appeals process" and the "formulary" (which existed when he was a MA resident--the Commonwealth Care program has the very same limitations, and has had them since RMoney rolled the program out--with bumps and mistakes and glitches, too--years ago) as well.

Most people, once they hit "a certain age," will endure challenges in their lives. Family members gets sick, some seriously, some die. It is natural to be upset or express frustration at the hoops one must jump through to deal with those issues.

It's NOT natural, though, to act like an ass amongst people who can offer you help. It's not polite, it's meanspirited to misdirect anger and attack the wrong person, too, and it's just...childish. Embarrassing. I'm guessing that's why he's laying low--he's waiting for the fuss to die down.

I am not saying any of this to be mean in any way. It's just how I view the whole stupid mess. He shot off his mouth, dramatically (as he has done in the past, here, and he's been forgiven, time and again), and this time, he got some push-back...and even then, he got some HELP -- from people who vociferously disagreed with his relentless, never-ending "Obama sucks waaah" attitudes, too.

All he had to do was ask without being a jerk about it. He would have had his answers in five posts. Not as much attention, or "recs," or hundreds of posts, or tearing of garments and wailing, but he would have gotten the same doggone answers.

He needs to learn to be just a little less disagreeable--unless he relishes the drama. It's a trait of mature people, adults -- and he's closer to fifty than twenty, I'm sure.