Thoughts on the Health Care "Crisis" and Obama's push for payment reform.

As everyone knows the President is pushing for a comprehensive program to overhaul how health care is paid for and to make sure everyone is adequately covered. Unfortunately, the solutions that he is advocating are going to cause an increase in spending by upwards of $2 trillion. This is only going to fuel inflation, further hurt our weak economy, and actually make it harder for people to get the care they desire.
Part of the problem is that health insurance has changed over the years. Insurance is meant to help people pay for catastrophes that may occur. That’s what your car insurance is for. You only use it if you are in an accident. Health insurance should be used only for catastrophes, such as accidents and hospitalizations. But it has developed into a service to pay for all aspects of health – the doctor visits. This would be the same as using your car insurance to pay for gas and oil changes. We think car insurance is expensive now, can you imagine what it would be like if it paid for the everyday things too? Well that’s what has happened to health insurance. People expect it to pay for everything, and now the government agrees. And it is going to cost.
That being said, since we are in the model of insurance paying for everything, let’s look at some of the costs. The cost of health care, from hospital to doctor bills, drugs, medical equipment, insurance, nursing homes, and home health care, doubled from 1994 to 2004. In 2004, the country spent $140 billion dollars more on health care than we did the year before. Overall, the tab for health care spending in this country is $1.8 trillion a year, which is four times the amount spent on national defense. 15% of America’s Gross Domestic Product is spent on medical care which amounts to $6289 per person every year! Is it any wonder that they are calling for some kind of change?
But let’s understand something. This is not money spent on “health care”. This is money spent on Disease Care. The cost of keeping people healthy is negligible, because healthy people do not need hospitals, prescriptions, medical equipment, nursing homes, or home health care. Sick people do, and it is the cost of treating illnesses that is skyrocketing the bill. So far, in all the discussions on Capitol Hill, not one mention has been made about lifestyle. It is all about how to pay for treating all the ill people. If people took more responsibility for their health, wouldn’t that make the costs go down?
Some illnesses are inevitable. But there is a lot the people can do to help themselves to avoid illness, because the two leading causes of illness in this country are smoking and obesity.
It is no secret that smoking tobacco causes heart disease; lung disease and cancer; cancer of the mouth and throat; cancer of the pancreas; and cancer of the intestinal tract. Yes, some people can live a full life of smoking without getting these illnesses, but they are the exception, not the rule. If you smoke, you will get ill. Cardiac disease costs the US more than $400 billion a year in medical expenses and lost productivity, and is responsible for almost six million hospitalizations each year! If the cost of treating cardiac disease is added into all the goods and services that we spend our money on, it is costing each family of four, $460 a month!
Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the US today. In 2004, more than half a million people died of cancer, which amounts to about 1500 people every day! It is estimated that tobacco use is responsible for more than 170,000 cancer deaths alone. In 2004, cancer cost this country $60.9 billion in direct medical costs and $135 billion in indirect costs due to illness for a total of almost $200 billion! How much is this costing you? Every person in this country has to contribute $719 each year, or $240 a month for a family of four. So far our little family of four is spending $700 a month to treat cancer and heart disease. That could pay most mortgages.
Obesity has also become a major problem in this country. Obesity rates have increased by more than 60% among adults in the last 10 years and will soon overtake smoking as the leading cause of preventable death. Since 1980, obesity rates have doubled among young children, and tripled among adolescents. Obesity is a contributor to many chronic diseases including Type 2 diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, stroke, breast cancer, colon cancer, gallbladder disease, and arthritis. The yearly bill for treating these conditions is $98 billion for Type 2 diabetes, $8.8 billion for heart disease, $5.3 billion for arthritis, $3.2 billion for gallbladder disease, $1.3 billion for colon cancer, and $1.1 billion for breast cancer. Overall, the total health bill for treating these diseases and others related to obesity not mentioned here is about $137 billion. This costs a family of four $1027 a year, or another $86 a month.
If we add up the costs of treating the health effects of smoking and obesity, our tab comes to more than $700 billion a year! Is it any wonder that it is becoming more and more difficult to pay for illness care?
The problem is that smoking is a choice. And most of the time, not always, obesity is too. If people want to have affordable health care, they have to stop doing things that make themselves sick and then expect the Doctor to fix them. If more people were to adopt healthy lifestyles, the need for this expensive system would go down, as would the costs. As I mentioned before, healthy people do not need hospitals, prescriptions, medical equipment, nursing homes, or home health care.
The government can’t fix this. Anything they get their hands on costs more. Before Medicare and Medicaid, everyone could afford their health care, no one went without. But now those programs, as well as the corporate take-over of health care in the form of PPO’s and HMO’s have served to drive up costs. Combine that with the unhealthy choices people make, and here we are. What we can do is adopt healthy choices. I know I am preaching to the choir here, but share this information with everyone you know. There is something we can do as individuals – opt out of the system, be healthy!

MIchael Jackson's Death

There is an article on Yahoo today, Sunday, June 28, that says that Michael Jackson's death is bringing a spotlight onto sudden cardiac arrest. The article quotes a cardiologist from the Cleveland Clinic who says that this malady claims anywhere from 200,000 to 300,000 lives a year. This is sad because what Jackson's death should bring attention to is drug abuse. Michael Jackson was on several prescribed drugs including Paxil, Zoloft, Soma, and Demerol. Demerol is a morphine like substance that in itself causes cardiac arrest, and he had had a shot of demerol less than one hour before he died. Soma is a "muscle relaxant" whose use is contra-indicated with opiates, of which demerol is one. On top of this, he was underweight and malnourished. Michael Jackson was a ticking time bomb that exploded on June 25.

Prescription drugs are one of the leading causes of death in the US today, and the leading cause of hospitalization. When will the medical profession wake up to the fact that their procedures kill people? The article on Yahoo which came from Healthday Reporter never mention the drugs he was on. Like smoke being the result of fire, in this case sudden cardiac arrest is the smoke from the fire of Jackson's drug abuse - prescribed by physicians! Instead of drawing attention to the smoke, let's look at the fire - drug abuse. It killed Elvis, Anna Nicole Smith, countless others, and now Micheal Jackson. Let's tell the truth, Michael Jackson's death is criminal, not an accident of something inherently wrong with his heart.

What Can You Afford?

Economic times are tough, there is no denying that. I have been hearing from some people lately that they need to cut back on their care or, worse yet, stop coming, because they can’t “afford” it right now. But what this really means is that they are going to rely on the traditional medical system for their “health care” because that is what they pay insurance premiums for and what insurance will cover. This is a Fool’s Paradise.
The American Medical System is not designed to keep people healthy; it is only designed to keep you not sick. There is a difference between the two. Health is a state of Wholeness and Well-being. It is a state where all your systems, and you, are functioning 100% of the time all of the time. A state of Health is defined by a high quality of life, not the presence or absence of symptoms. There is nothing that the medical world can offer that will provide that.
Medicine developed a model of disease. All its treatments are based upon a negative model. They are all “anti”: antidepressants, antipsychotics, antibiotics, antihistamines, and so on. Their language is one of warfare: The war on cancer, the war on drugs, we have to fight this or that illness, we will give you a “battery” of drugs. The body has become a battle ground, and you are the casualty.
They only offer three things: Drugs that poison you, surgery that rapes you of your organs, and radiation that burns your body and rips apart your DNA. Modern medicine is the leading cause of preventable death in the US today killing the same amount of people who died in the World Trade Center on September 11, EVERY WEEK!!! Tell me; where is the health in this and why do you pay for it?
The key to health is not to avoid disease, but to maintain the integrity of your body. This is the Chiropractic approach. Most people know that good nutrition and exercise are important. But what good is all that if the controlling system of the body is sick? The sole purpose of the chiropractic adjustment is to maintain the health and integrity of your nerve system – the system that controls your body and very life.
Your nerve system coordinates body movement, unless it is sick. Your nerve system coordinates your heart beat and breath, unless it is sick. Your nerve system regulates the thousands of reactions that your cells undergo, unless it is sick. Your nerve system IS your immune system and protects you from infection, unless it is sick. Your nerve system coordinates all the healing and repair of your body, unless it is sick. When your nerve system becomes sick, you become sick.
And what makes the nerve system sick? Stress! And everyone has some level of stress in their lives. Stress distorts the spinal cord, the connecting link between the brain and the rest of you. Only, and I mean only, the chiropractic adjustment can tune your nerve system to improve mind-body communication, to keep you healthy. Vitamins won’t do it. Prayer won’t do it. Reiki won’t do it. Drugs won’t do it. Exercise won’t do it. The spine has to be adjusted!
For this reason, what we do here is not about treating your diseases, but raising the level of your body’s health so that it does not slowly break down and take you on the road of illness and despair. For the only thing you will find at the end of that road is a Disease care system that will hasten your death. If you are healthy, you don’t need Medicine. Chiropractic care is not a luxury, but a necessity. This is your insurance policy! You are investing in yourself and your future. For people to say they can’t afford it and go with the program that their insurance pays for is ludicrous. If you value your health, you will stay off that road! And, as Forest Gump said, “That’s all I have to say about that.”

Innate Intelligence with Deepak Chopra, MD

This is a short video with Deepak Chopra. The concept of Innate Intelligence has been central to chiropractic philosophy since its inception in 1895. In this video, Dr. Chopra explains Innate beautifully. The nerve system is the heart of Innate, a clear nerve system always produces a healthy body!

The Swine Flu, Fact or Fiction?

Many people have been asking me my opinion on the recent emergence of the Swine Flu. Here is a great article that explains it all and should put your mind at rest. It is not the end of the world!
http://articles.mercola.com/redirect/view.aspx?Email=drehren@yahoo.com&ReturnURL=http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/04/29/Swine-Flu.aspx

This is a nice slide show that explains Chiropractic Philosophy so anyone can understand it. Please watch and share with your friends and family!

This video is an advertisement for Mercola.com, but presents great statistics about the dangers modern medicine poses to your health. Medicine is NOT health care, it is disease care. People who make regular chiropractic care a part of their life enjoy greater health and well-being, without the need for dangerous drugs!