Howdy Doody Dag friends . . .

I came across a very fine comment by Artappraiser in Flavius's post "We Were Wrong About Obamacare" related to the problems associated with the present day medical care system that is at the heart of health costs in our present system.

I couldn't agree more that, as AA stated, "...High tech medical innovation makes for a moral mess, whether it's a for-profit system or a totally non-profit national health service..." and when speaking generally about the elderly on Medicare (of which I am one) AA stated,  "No one is coordinating what drugs they are taking, there aren't enough gerontologists nor anyone gatekeeping their care..."

We have been members of the Kaiser health system for 28 years. We have fortunately had the services of the same doctor there for the last 15 years. He's become a very highly respected gerontolgist as he's aged with us. And that's where it all starts. If we were not satisfied with him we would not allow him to be our doctor. He understands that we know more about what ails us than he knows. He listens.

And whether or not people wish to face the fact and understand, there is a large part of the care that comes down to being responsible of educating oneself.

Now, about the pain in the backside? Artappraiser used the following example:

For one instance, I recently was trying to figure out what to do about a really bad case of sciatica type pain. So I go to American forums about it where everyone is bitching that the doctors here send you for  all the MRI's and cat scans and then want to blame it on a herniated disc and want to do surgery on the herniated disks when there isn't sufficient evidence that that helps, but they won't give you a prescription for pain meds. Then I go to UK forums on the same and find everyone bitching that they can't get the docs to give them an MRI, that all the docs are doing is giving them pain meds On either side of the pond, neither are getting the intensive physical therapy that would probably work best for most, because of monetary choices (on one side, for profit reasons, on another for saving money reasons.)

And the following from the Mayo Clinic is what should be the first therapy after your Orthopedist has run you through the basic X-rays and thorough physical exam:

To see all 8 exercises: mayoclinic.com/health/back-pain

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The above exercises were first exhibited for me through my Orthopedist at Kaiser Health Clinic in 1986. I had been suffering from sciatica pain for quite some time. Within 2 weeks of doing these exercises my pain was gone. I continue to faithfully do these exercises on a daily basis. It all about alignment, muscle strengthening and proper relaxation.

~OGD~