5 Medical Money Savers

Here are five medical money savers to help you spend your health dollars wisely.

1. Keep weight stable. It is the healthy thing to do. This will save on grocery and clothing expenses. Long term savings on medical expenses.
2. Get prescription meds in bulk quantity of 100 versus thirty day supply especially if you are paying for your meds.Buy nonprescription medical items in bulk when on sale. You will be amazed at your savings when you buy a six to twelve month supply on sale. This tip is also effective for emergency preparedness.
3. Check with your state provisions for health care. Many states have low cost insurance plans available. Check what your state has to offer by contacting the state health agency.
4. Talk with your doctor by phone, fax, and email to save on the cost of an office visit payment. Just think about the number of office visits you have been to where all you did was talk (after waiting for a long while). Save your time and money.
5. For blood pressure checks, get yourself a home blood pressure monitor. Call in your readings. Many doctors will discover that your blood pressure is actually stable when the stress of the doctor's white coat is absent. For diabetics, a home glucometer is very useful for monitoring blood sugar.

Invest in your most important asset - YOU.
Great health is true wealth!

J.L. Richardson, MD, family medicine expert, is the author of the award winning, Patient Handbook to Medical Care: Your Personal Health Guide.

Doctor-Patient Communication Suboptimal

This email reply is in regards to my poll question on preferred way patients wish to be contacted by their doctors for their test results (http://twtpoll.com/mn9yin), if they are contacted at all.

Of course, "if you don't hear anything that means all is okay" is definitely not the answer. Many patients have been wrongly diagnosed, diagnosed too late, or died with this mantra. Lack of followup by patients and doctors is one of the top reasons for adverse outcomes and wrong diagnosis that lead to malpractice suits, delay in diagnosis, etc.

Make it your decision to contact your doctor if you don't hear about your test results in a timely manner. How you wish to contact your doctor is up to you. Make sure you followup if your doctor fails to do so.


Much thanks to Rachel Rosenfeld for allowing me to share this insightful information.

Dear Dr. Richardson,

Thanks for the DM regarding how to contact patients about test results.

In various roles as patient, family member, friend, caretaker and advocate, and in being in late 50s and having seen medicine (when did it become healthcare) change over a half century, here's my take:

40 years ago, medicine was less rushed, docs had time to pore over test results and a call from the nurse "everything came back ok" was the norm . Why did patients need specifics, they knew their doctor-god would watch over them.

Fast forward to the present with informed, educated patients as consumers, overworked physicians providing assembly-line medicine and yes, occasionally forgetting Mrs. Cardwell's first name. We know our numbers these days, or we know about our chronic conditions, we know when our hypothyroidism is not quite under control for example and "normal" won't cut it when that number is outside our personal normal limits. My cholesterol is "a little high but ok" - but what's the
change since last year? My lymphocytes are high but total count is normal - and you didn't bother to call me and I have sarcoidosis and almost died from that untreated infection that lingered for six months....

We patients watch our numbers, or our conditions ... in my case, let's watch my CA and my BUN and creatinine and the white blood cells, I'm not too worried about anything else. For my brother, it would be trends in glucose and cholesterol ...

And we know where to find the results from last month, last year, we know how we feel compared to those lab results and we know how to adjust behaviors for something trending negatively (e.g. cholesterol), or how to get hold of our specialist for something outside normal limits (e.g., elevated CA or lymphocytes as in my sarcoidosis).

But we have to be told, whether it's by direct access (hospitals in Northwest FL have been doing this for years), email, fax or phone.

"Everything's normal" is no longer the accepted norm.

Shalom
Rachel Rosenfeld

Healthcare Reform Changes Due Date?

When will the health care changes occur? Why have we ceased hearing about everyone having access to the same health plan as the President and Congress as promised during their campaigns?

My insurance premium has risen over $100 per year in the past 5 years and is now almost $900 per month! I have COBRA. The President says those with COBRA will get lower premiums. Will this be retroactive as well?

Should I consider dropping my insurance vs. seeking a new insurance? Unavoidable pre-existing conditions pose a problem no matter what. The President says this will cease.

By the time a health care bill is approved, I fear my insurance premium will have skyrocketed beyond my ability to pay. Mind you this does not include any other medical costs like prescriptions, treatments prescribed by my doctor that the insurance company does not cover, co payments, over the counter medication/ supplies, etc.

P.S. As a doctor, please let me dispel the myth that we (and nurses) are "paid too much". Today doctors finishing medical school entering residency are in debt at least $50,000 to $100,000 or more. Residency training barely pays enough to cover monthly living expenses.

by J.L. Richardson, MD, family medicine doctor and author of Patient Handbook to Medical Care: Your Personal Health Guide, the book that helps you take care of your most important asset - YOU!

www.mypatienthandbook.com
www.twitter.com/MD4U
www.blogtalkradio.com/drjfpmd

Medical TV: Where is the Health News Channel?

Medical information on TV is limited and stagnating. Sixty seconds on the news. Two minutes on the talk show after commercials on prescription medication. Outdated show on this channel, and outdated repeat on that channel in between the new show. Watch some on this channel then click and click to different channels to connect your medical news for today.


Remember the crawler at the bottom of the screen. Oh, you missed that there was a bird flu outbreak in Pakistan today, and that HPV vaccines will be required for teen women and men. These are the ways we learn about some of the most important news we should know. It concerns our health and public safety.

If only we had a dedicated medical TV CNN (instead of just Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s excellent show on early weekend mornings, or his occasional special). You know, like the sports channels by sport, the cartoon channels by age (and now one for the boomers!), the movie channels, government channels, and on and on. Where is the “MTV” of medical channels? Discovery Health has been carrying the TV health media for years. There should be more!


The TV box is probably the most used medium by which folks get their news and information. It is certainly a way to get information to people. The most used information source is one of the least used by the cutting edge medical field. This was noted in my research paper, “Building an American Health System”, in 2002. This is 2007, and it’s pretty much the same, maybe even less.

A medical TV channel (actually several would be optimal) would be great! A daily health news show would be a great start towards 24-7 medical TV. Envision yourself clicking to the heart channel, or to programs with content about specific diseases. You could learn more about that high blood pressure you are trying to control, and how you can monitor it at home. Topics on maintaining good health, and prevention of disease would be a click away. And if you missed a show, it would be shown again and again.


Health and medical coverage on TV is surely lacking in this consumer driven health conscious society. We can watch as much sports, cartoons, movies, news as we want, but we still have to piece together our medical news and supplement it with the written word, or health care providers’ spoken word. And radio.

Great health is true wealth. Medical TV would make us even richer.

by J.L. Richardson, MD, family medicine physician, patient advocate and caregiver, and author of Patient Handbook to Medical Care: Your Personal Health Guide.
www.mypatienthandbook.com
www.blogtalkradio.com/drjfpmd (book reading by author)
www.twitter.com/drjfpmd

Save Your Life

"Save your life!" is the title for this blog on Patient Handbook to Medical Care: Your Personal Health Guide. It was written by Sue Leonard of Cornerstone Fulfillment Service on her blog All Things Fulfilling.

It is so nice to know that this book is helping to save lives. Health maintenance, wellness, prevention, and early detection/treatment are the keys to unlocking your best health.

http://allthingsfulfilling.wordpress.com/2009/08/03/save-your-life/

Thank you Sue for this powerful message that is one of all things fulfilling!