SpikedRocker
6 May 2008, 06:21am
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/05/05/pandemic.rationing.ap/index.html
This story is causing some heated debates over who should be treated in a medical disaster. If you are old, severely hurt or burned, have chronic medical symptoms (severe heart problems or even alzheimer's), you might not get medical help in a medical emergency. Reasoning being to ration the use of medical equipment such as ventilators, surgury rooms, and other things that may be in short order in most hospitals.
I find this troubling due to that it all comes down to the doctors perception of the patient. One doctor might find someone's burns are worse than another doctor. In a medical disaster things happen so fast that if you wait to make decisions of who gets treatment first you might loose more people. In my opinion, take who you can when they come in. If someone arrives before another its just natures way of things. To make rules or guidelines governing who deserves medical treatment is wrong. Everyone should be eligible for medical treatment when they need it.
I guess I am more emotional over this because my father essentially died because of simular things already in place. He didn't show symptoms serious enough to be seen right away. He waited in the waiting room for 10 hours as other people with "more serious" things went before him. It turned out to be a rare quick acting diesease that if not diagnosed quickly it is 99% fatal. So if he would have been seen earlier he might have lived longer than a week in ICU. Just my opinion though.
This story is causing some heated debates over who should be treated in a medical disaster. If you are old, severely hurt or burned, have chronic medical symptoms (severe heart problems or even alzheimer's), you might not get medical help in a medical emergency. Reasoning being to ration the use of medical equipment such as ventilators, surgury rooms, and other things that may be in short order in most hospitals.
I find this troubling due to that it all comes down to the doctors perception of the patient. One doctor might find someone's burns are worse than another doctor. In a medical disaster things happen so fast that if you wait to make decisions of who gets treatment first you might loose more people. In my opinion, take who you can when they come in. If someone arrives before another its just natures way of things. To make rules or guidelines governing who deserves medical treatment is wrong. Everyone should be eligible for medical treatment when they need it.
I guess I am more emotional over this because my father essentially died because of simular things already in place. He didn't show symptoms serious enough to be seen right away. He waited in the waiting room for 10 hours as other people with "more serious" things went before him. It turned out to be a rare quick acting diesease that if not diagnosed quickly it is 99% fatal. So if he would have been seen earlier he might have lived longer than a week in ICU. Just my opinion though.