Health Insurance Crisis? Solved.

September 24, 2009 at 12:40 pm (health insurance)
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cone

Don’t panic.  I may have done it.  Yes, your friendly chiroblogger may have accidently solved the national healthcare crisis.  I found an existing health insurance company that provides comprehensive health coverage for under $40 per month.  And this isn’t just some catastophic Roadrunner gets smushed by a falling safe and winds up in traction kind of coverage.  This is really good.  Really, really good.  Just look at these benefits:

Illness – Covered
Injuries & accidents – Covered
Hospitalization – Covered
Surgery – Covered
Hereditary conditions – Covered
Diagnostics – Covered
Prescription medications – Covered
Vaccinations – Covered
Annual Exams – Covered   
Dental Scaling/Polishing  – Covered
 
Wow!  Prescriptions?  Dental cleanings?  They even include some elective surgical procedures.  For forty bucks a month?  There aren’t even any copayments!  I’m awaiting the phone call from Obama any second now.
 
This just may be the ticket the country is waiting for. 
 
Now, there are a couple of exclusions.  There’s always fine print, right?  Okay, the following are not covered: parvo, distemper, kennel cough, heartworms and feline leukemia.  And grooming, bathing and dipping are out too.  Other than that, PurinaCare seems to provide a pretty darn good health insurance for a really reasonable price. 
 
Crazy, right? Dogs and cats get high quality health insurance while their owners are left to be ill.  What’s in it for we, the people?  A lot, according to the North American Pet Health Insurance Association (NAPHIA). 
 
According to recent studies, the NAPHIA figure the health benefits of  pet ownership  include:
  • Reduced risk of cardiovascular disease
  • Higher survival rates from heart attacks
  • Significantly lower use of general practitioner services
  • Reduced risk of asthma and allergic rhinitis in children exposed to pet allergens during the first year of their life
  • Better physical and psychological well-being for seniors

    • Interesting.  These are pretty tangible preventative health benefits.  I may have solved the health insurance situation after all.  I mean, obviously the pet insurance companies won’t cover people.  But if the benefits of pet ownership are so great for health, I might just start instructing my uninsured patients to take two kittens and call me in the morning.  Problem solved.

    Next?

     

    Dr. Brett Kinsler is a chiropractor in Rochester, NY.  He is insured but his cat (favorite hobby = peeing in corners) has no coverage.

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    This is why you’re marginal

    September 7, 2009 at 9:40 pm (Chiropractors & Chiropractic)
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    chiroad2009

    We are fairly insulated in Rochester from sleazy, totally unprofessional chiropractor advertisements.  They occasionally pop up like freaky little mushrooms and usually get stomped on rapidly.   Here’s one that appeared in a local fishwrapper this week.  Let’s have a little contest – how many unprofessional, insulting or just plain factually incorrect items appear in this ad?  Keep in mind the total ad has less than 100 words!

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    Up the Nose With a Rubber Hose

    September 3, 2009 at 9:35 am (Evidence Based Medicine, Inventions, Patient Information)
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    balloon_nose

    Sinusitis is an inflammation of the sinuses that occurs with a viral, bacterial, or fungal infection.  There can be pain and nasal congestion.  Acute sinusitis often follows a cold, but chronic sinusitis can last for extended periods and make people miserable.  More than 30 million Americans suffer from chronic sinusitis, meaning symptoms last longer than two months or regularly recur. Patients repeatedly try antibiotics, decongestants or steroid-containing nasal sprays, but about a quarter are thought to get inadequate relief.  Sometimes, surgery is the best option for chronic sufferers.  Standard surgery involves cutting away bone in the sinus cavity to open the passage way and allow drainage.

    This week, a patient asked me about a procedure where they stick a balloon up a patient’s nose and inflate it in order to ‘move the skull bones’ and help with sinus problems.  I thanked him for the idea for a blog article and began to do my research on what I was sure would turn out to be some wacko in a clinic in California (why is it always California?) sticking things up people’s noses and declaring them “Sinus Free!”

    Instead, I got educated on a new alternative to the standard sinus surgery.  Balloon Sinuplasty is compared to angioplasty — you know the procedure where a catheter is fed through an artery and plaques are squeezed to the sides with an inflatable balloon.  With the sinuplasty, the catheter is inserted into the sinus cavity and inflated to open the passageway and promote fluid drainage and pressure reduction.  Inflating the balloon aims to stretch the sinus opening back to its original size or little bigger, thus letting air (and antibiotics) into the sinus.

    The research looks promising for this technology and it is most certainly not a novel means of cranial adjusting as I initially suspected.  Whew.  Patients who have the balloon catheter procedure appear to have significant improvement in symptoms two years after surgery.

    The best part is that the research generally scores patient symptoms using my favorite clinical instrument:  the SNOT – 20 which I discussed in a previous post.

     

    Dr. Kinsler is a chiropractor in Rochester, NY.

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    Servings per container: 557?

    September 1, 2009 at 8:57 am (Critical Thinking, Nutrition, Skepticism, Vegan & Vegetarianism)
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    cookingspray

    One of those people with a good sense of the absurd?  Here is something absurd that’s probably right in your kitchen.  Get out your favorite brand of cooking spray (found in almost all American homes) and check the serving size.  Chances are, it will be somewhere between 0.25 and 0.33 seconds.  That’s between 1/4 and 1/3 of a second.  The servings per container will be between 350 and 600. 

    This is a perfect example of why we have such a problem with achieving health in this country.  No, not cooking spray.  Misleading information presented as fact.  Maybe somewhere, in some test kitchen, a trained professional can spray for only .25 seconds but everyone I know really wants to coat that pan with ‘non-fat’ cooking spray.  Problem is, used the way most people really do, it is not non-fat.  In fact, it is oil.  Pure fat. 

    For comparison, a can of cooking spray is about 6 ounces. A stick and a half of butter is 6 ounces.  Imagine cutting that stick and a half of butter into 557 pieces.  Now, spread one on your toast.  Congratulations, you have just had ‘fat-free’ butter.

    We have been led to believe that non-fat cooking spray is much healthier than oil.  So which is better?  Well, one comes in a spray can with propellants.  At least with the pure oil most people would try to be judicious. 

    In fact, if you are using non stick pans, then the cooking spray is redundant.  If you are trying to cook with no fat, it would be preferable to cook  just with broth or water.  Yes, you really can sauté in just plain water.  I prefer broth or wine for flavor but water works just fine.  Plus, it’s free –no spray can needed.

    Dr. Michalene Elliott is a chiropractor in Rochester who writes for RochesterChiro’s blog and has tried to spray for less than half a second but, sadly, cannot.

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