No one studies the effort of managing one's health care

[firecat]

This is yet another thing that people with medical conditions get blamed for—not managing their own care well enough, although according to this article NO ONE studies the efforts required to manage one's own health care.

(Content note: one use of the "O-word")

"But American medicine demands another scarce resource from patients, and that is their time. The time it takes to check in on the status of a prescription, to wait for a doctor, to take time away from work to sit on hold and hope that, at some point, someone will pick up the phone.
...
"There is a risk associated with not measuring patient work: namely, that patients will give up when life gets in the way. This is an especially acute worry for lower-income patients, who often work for hourly wages and have little space to change their schedules."

http://www.vox.com/2016/6/1/11712776/healthcare-footprint

Comments

[snippy]

I read that earlier today and realized how lucky I was to have a doctor who has a nurse who is specifically trained to help patients with executive function stuff. For example, when I was given a bunch of difficult instructions about when to take meds and when to eat and when to exercise and when I could go to bed, the nurse helped me work out a schedule that went around my job and preferred sleep hours. And how lucky that all my docs deal with the preclearance for insurance before asking the testing facilities to call me to schedule an appointment.

[thnidu]

You are indeed fortunate.

[snippy]

Yeah, it shouldn't be luck. It should be standard practice.

[firecat]

It's great that your doctor has that resources. And yes, my doctor's offices usually deal with clearing expensive tests with insurance. (And despite their having that staff, I've still been billed for the tests and had to jump through hoops providing evidence that the test was pre-cleared.) And I'm not at all surprised that some offices don't.

[lilysea]

when I was given a bunch of difficult instructions about when to take meds and when to eat and when to exercise and when I could go to bed, the nurse helped me work out a schedule that went around my job and preferred sleep hours.

Oh, that sounds great. *envious*

I've put off starting meds that I need for over a year because the pill regime was too complex for me to wrap my brain around.

Basically, until I get off the Lyrica (pregabalin), which messes with thinking and executive function, I won't have the brain to do the Lyme disease meds.