Word: iras
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Ira is about the same age; his shoulders, hands, hips and knees have all bothered him for years. Unlike Tony, he likes physical therapy. I've been warning him about letting the problems go too long, especially the numb hands, but since the '90s he has refused every procedure. About four months ago, something changed with him too. He requested surgery - first a shoulder, then the hands. He's been having an operation a month since then, quite happily. He still has another scheduled...
...picture with their orthopedic surgeon. They love talking about the government plan, insurance companies, overseas surgery outfits, electronic medical records. Often, I enjoy it too. It can slow down office hours but it beats droning on about glucosamine. From many hours of chat with many patients like Tony and Ira has emerged one strong theme: "Get it while you still...
...those patients in the middle - Medicare patients like Ira and Tony, the younger HMO types doing well but working harder and harder, the aging professionals dealing with their first serious pains - they seem to be of a new mind lately. So do the unemployed who foresee the day their COBRA benefits will end, and the still fully employed whose company plans in 2010 entail higher deductibles, higher copays and reduced benefits. Whatever their situation, these patients are less interested in therapy and anti-inflammatories, or in just waiting to see if the pain stops by itself. (Quite often it does...
...Ira reads the papers like a hawk; Tony, not so much. But they are both worried that the days when they could afford an elective surgery with the doctor of their choice may be coming to an end. Tony and Ira ran small businesses in America all their adult lives; they understand budgets. They think the government is going broke - and in their early years, they've seen governments go broke before. They have seen big ambitious government plans do great damage, and so they maintain a deep suspicion of even the best intentions. I truly hope they are wrong...
Read "Journalist Wins Right to Withhold Information on the Real IRA...