Thursday, May 20, 2010

Daily dose of frstration.

During class this morning, a discussion arose regarding how hospitals fit into the sociological (garbage) concept of "McDonaldization. Now, first of all, heaven for bid if McDonalds doesn't run the most successful company in the world, so to use that term to clearly imply something that's wrong is, itself, wrong. In any event, one of the other students commented that hospitals don't fit the idea of "efficiency" because of long waits in the ER, and started to bitch about it. Calmly I raised my hand, and defended the imperfect hospital system. Not because I particularly enjoy long ER waits, but because there simply is not an endless supply of Doctors/money that hospitals can spend on staff. Being sick sucks and the hospitals are doing the best they can. This, however, wasn't the real kicker. The student then dove into the whole "they don't even know my records from previous tests so they have to waste time running more which is so inefficient" bit. I won't disagree with the fact that that is inefficient. However, what really got me going was his, and other students' support for a system in which there would be universal access by all physicians to ANY persons medical records at any time, just in case you happen to get sick in, say, a foreign land. I cannot possibly be the only person that see's this as a disgusting invasion of personal privacy, not to mention ILLEGAL. Its not my fault that you decided to journey to the Amazon and got some Oregon Trail jungle disease that no longer threatens civilized society, and I'm not willing to lose my personal privacy because you think you're "cultural." If you go to an ER ANYWHERE in the US, there is a place on the check in form where you can provide the name and # of your primary care physician who has any pertinent record that is necessary. Should I lose my right to privacy because you're to foolish to know/have your Dr's #? No sir. Sometimes, reality sucks, but in the long run, idealism is far worse.

1 comment:

  1. Honestly if there was a system that one could voluntarily sign up for that would have a secured system of housing medical records that would not be a bad idea. I personally would rather have my records be easily accessible to physicians. As long as my ssn is protected I dont care if my records can be seen.

    If we are given a choice the system would not be illegal but would as the person described in some situations a major saver for both time and money for all involved.

    If you want to talk about actually illegal activities we can discuss Arizonas racial profiling.

    You make quite the claim in your last sentence but there is absolutely nothing in the blog the even remotely backs that up.