Medico-cultural shock for the uninsured patient

Lymphopo, over at As the Tumor Turns, had a mammogram last week. If you haven't been following her story, she's a 50ish gal who, just about a year ago was diagnosed with a very aggressive Stage IV lymphoma -- sort of out of nowhere, as she'd been living the good life, well, all her life: a nonsmoker, eater of wholesome and organic food, an athlete. A bodybuilder, for dogssake.

The story of her year-long oddysey through medical diagnosis and treatment was harrowing enough, but, as an uninsured freelance writer (I think), she was forced to seek treatment at an institution she referred to as "Our Lady of the Damned Charity Hospital." Not one of your nicer facilities, if you know what I mean. Fortunately, she educated herself about her illness, the available treatments, and became a fierce and articulate advocate for her own care. Talked back to the authorities. The "squeaky wheel" procedure does help, sometimes. It's not something that everybody can do (nor should they have to) while gravely ill, though.

It was not pretty, (nor in fact cheap), and she still ended up deeply in debt and having to sell her gorgeous, funky old house. And her personal relationships suffered, not uncommon when someone faces a life-threatening illness.

But, hideous as that chapter in her life was, it's turning out to have a happy-ish ending; she is cured of the lymphoma. It's gone. Except for the fear that many cancer patients experience after successful treatments: every little change, every twinge of pain -- is that more cancer? She is still trying to recover from the effects of the treatments she underwent, trying to pull her life back together, trying to regain the muscle mass and strength she lost.

Plus she is expecting her first grandbaby, studying art, making plans. Adopted a beautiful new dog. All in all, hers is an amazing story. Inspirational, even, in a way. Certainly sheds light on the hideous inequalities of our medical system. Especially the mammogram story the other day.

See, she didn't go back to Our Lady of the Damned; rather, she went to the new-ish "Deep Inferno General Hospital" facility, where she'd been a few times before the lymphoma diagnosis, and which she'd previously found nice enough but unremarkable. But her experiences at the publicly-(under)funded charity hospital had changed her. The differences between the two places -- from the ease with which she found a parking place to the clean floors to the current issues of magazines in the waiting rooms -- were mind-bending, causing her to burst (publicly) into uncontrollable, snot-spewing laughter:

"Is there a word for this, a clinical term, for a semi-hysterical reaction to the culture shock of being swung like Tarzan on a vine across the nation's great yawning medical gap, flying through the air and landing with a thud on its radically, irreconcilably opposite shore?"

Alas, my friend, I can't think of any such word. Most people don't have the opportunity to see it up close and personal like that. It is shocking. It isn't fair. It is not right, not on any level.