"If somebody called me about a patient that was losing her vision or had a structural abnormality of the brain I would see them within days."
Here is how the Toronto Star reported the story, and the claims in Sept of 2007:
"....(Ms.) Holmes began losing her vision in March 2005, she told a press conference at Queen's Park yesterday. An MRI in May 2005 revealed a tumour in her brain. Her family doctor couldn't expedite appointments booked with specialists for July 19 and Sept. 19, 2005. As the tumour pressed on her optic nerves, her vision deteriorated. Afraid to wait any longer, she went to the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Within a week she met three specialists and was told she had a fluid-filled sac growing near her pituitary gland at the base of her brain. They urged her to have it taken out immediately. She went home with the hopes of quickly removing what is known as a Rathke's cleft cyst.
Unable to get surgery fast, she returned to Arizona and had the mass removed on Aug. 1, 2005. Her vision was restored in 10 days. The Holmes family is now in debt $95,000 because of medical costs."....
The British Columbia government's energy plan and the future of new renewable-power projects in the province have been shaken by a ruling from the B.C. Utilities Commission.
After hearings that lasted almost a year, the commission has rejected BC Hydro's long-term acquisition plan as “not in the public interest” and has refused to endorse its push for clean energy....
They go door to door asking neighbours about you. They call your family and co-workers and suggest that they might call your employer.
You're driving down the street. Police stop you for a not-so-routine check and, over the next 40 minutes, you are questioned and your foreign visitors are warned that they need to carry their identification documents with them at all times.
China? No, Vancouver. It's all part of the security shakedown before the 2010 Winter Olympics are held in what is supposedly one of the freest, most open and transparent democracies in the world.....
{snippety doodle-dandy}....When Chinese security made surprise "visits" to activists, it was front-page news worldwide with screaming headlines about the repressive, autocratic, military dictatorship.
It should be no different this year.
Canadians ought to be furious with politicians for letting it get this far. We should be jamming their e-mail, voice mail and snail-mail boxes in protest....
Five years ago I was rushed to hospital with severe head pains. A scan revealed a serious life-threatening brain tumour (glioblastoma). So I was immediately admitted to the Trillium Centre in Mississauga where surgery was performed to remove as much of the tumour as possible. After I was released from hospital I was referred to the Juravinski Cancer Centre in Hamilton where I was immediately started on radiation and oral chemotherapy treatment.
The fact that I am alive today is a testament to the prompt, effective, excellent treatment I received under the Canadian health care system.
As a Canadian who has lived in your country, I got mighty upset when I saw my fellow countryperson, Ms. Shona Holmes, acting as a shill for the Canadian Healthcare Haters' Club, Inc.
So I wrote a couple of diaries about it here and here.
Which led to some good discussion, much of which seemed to center around wait times which, I've come to learn, is something that seems to be spooking even progressives.
As a result, I tried to write something realistic in response that goes like this:
First off, let me say the following (skip the next passage if you want to get straight to the answer)…..When we lived in the States I worked for a University and had what, I now understand (but didn’t then) is a Cadillac plan….We had our first kid down there and the care was very, very good….but, overall the co-pays and the nickle-and-diming with just about every visit and every prescription just about drove me crazy (I was a post-doctoral fellow so, even though I got the benefits, my actual pay was crap)…. And then, when I had an old chonic problem of my own flare up, it took some time, but not an unreasonable length of time, to get referred to the required specialist….I knew precisely what I needed (given my past experience with a similar specialist up here in Canada) but this guy, a staffer with the HMO, hemmed and hawed and ultimately would not give it to me (it involved a course of expensive antibiotics). Instead, he handled the problem very conservatively and it took much longer to resolve than I was used to… So, what’s the point?….Well, in Canada, where the system is Universal, when something like that happens you can go back to your family doctor and ask for another referral…Nobody at the HMO would help me do anything as crazy as that, so I just waited it out (nothing life-threatening, just a pain the, almost literally, rear end).
Now, getting right down to wait times….Anything urgent is dealt with immediately….Anything truly elective is most definitely not dealt with immediately…In between, say a knee ligament reconstruction after you’ve hurt yourself running around on the softball field, is where it becomes greyer.
However, overall, in my experience the following passage, from another border straddler named Rhonda Hackett who wrote a very good piece recently in the Denver Post that every American who has nagging concerns about really going for Universality and/or a true Public Option should read called ‘Debunking Canadian Healthcare Myths’:
Myth: There are long waits for care, which compromise access to care.
There are no waits for urgent or primary care in Canada. There are reasonable waits for most specialists’ care, and much longer waits for elective surgery. Yes, there are those instances where a patient can wait up to a month for radiation therapy for breast cancer or prostate cancer, for example. However, the wait has nothing to do with money per se, but everything to do with the lack of radiation therapists. Despite such waits, however, it is noteworthy that Canada boasts lower incident and mortality rates than the U.S. for all cancers combined, according to the U.S. Cancer Statistics Working Group and the Canadian Cancer Society. Moreover, fewer Canadians (11.3 percent) than Americans (14.4 percent) admit unmet health care needs.
Hope this helps you all.
_____
Sorry to be so verbose about all of this, but I’ve just got to reiterate the central tenet of the Canadian system that I mentioned in my original post…..We never worry….We may gripe sometimes…..But we never worry….For example, want to change jobs?…..We don’t worry about losing our coverage…..Lose your job?….We don’t worry about losing our coverage….Get sick?…..We don’t worry about losing our house to pay the hospital bills….Why?…Because the thing is completely portable and it’s always there.OK?
Best of luck with the battle.
RossK.
_____
Oh, and if you want the real hard stuff, from a guy I like to call our own version of Steve Gilliard, check this out..
But here's the real thing, Ms. Holmes did not have a malignant brain tumor.
Instead, she had a benign condition called 'Rathke's cleft' which is a self-contained cyst that does not spread. Therefore, speed is not of the essence, as it would be in, say, a case of malignant glioma that does rapidly spread. In fact, most of those cysts are embryological remmants (ie. they form while the baby is still developing in utero and hang around for the person's entire life). Thus, they are often treated conservatively unless secondary symptoms arise (ie. because of where they are they can push on the pituitary or the optic nerve).
Therefore, in my best estimation at least, the fact that Ms. Holmes was not rushed into surgery in Ontario likely made both good medical AND good health care system sense.
Regarding the latter, think of it this way....Ms. Holmes, who was not in imminent danger, was was asked to wait a bit so that the clinicians involved could get a handle on whether or not it was progressing (ie. the usual conservative treatment decision for this condition) AND so that the glioma patients who really, really needed it could get their treatment first.
Now.... Ms. Holmes decided she couldn't wait....So, instead, she went south and had the relatively straightforward surgery to drain the cyst right away at a cost of $97,000.
Which is fair enough.
Just don't blame Canada for not letting her jump the queue.
Why?
Because the fact is that the folks in front of her in the line needed their immediate surgery much more than she did, which is something the great majority of Canadians agree is how things should be.
There is, of course, something else that the great majority of Canadians also agree upon.
Which is that nobody should have to pay $97,000 for any kind of medical treatment.
And we don't.
And because of that we don't lose our houses, or worse, when we get catastrophically ill.Several of the relevant e-mails describe the setting up of meetings between Kinsella and B.C. Rail, she said.
“The defence submits that it’s significant that B.C. Rail is meeting with Kinsella a few months after the 2001 election,” said the judge.
“The e-mails refer to meetings to discuss the plans for the 2004 railway.
“Given that B.C. Rail was put on the market in 2002, and the charges come from that event, these documents are likely relevant. Mr. Kinsella does not have a privacy interest on the documents.”
Justice Bennett said some of the records are clearly not relevant to the defence of Dave Basi, Bob Virk and Aneal Basi – who are accused of trading in confidential government information and taking bribes – and she ruled that that material not be disclosed.
She ordered the release of numerous records that are “likely relevant,” and over which Mr. Kinsella cannot assert privacy interests. And she put other documents into a third category – likely relevant but subject to privacy interests – which will be vetted, so that private information can be redacted before release.
This, to my mind at least, looks to be an extremely prudent course of action."....Ben Stewart, minister responsible for Citizens' Services, which oversees the government department managing information technology. (An aide said the minister just didn't want to discuss the issue.)..."
Sue Goldsmith, Ms. Hayes's predecessor, who understands how the electronic storage system works as well as anyone and whose name surfaced in the Hayes affidavit.
Lee Johnson, an official at EDS Advanced Solutions, the company contracted by government to destroy the records requested by the defence. He was dealing with Ms. Hayes regarding the order to destroy the government information that the defence was seeking in the corruption trial.
It would appear people have either gone into hiding voluntarily or been ordered there by the Premier's office, which controls all messaging during times of crisis. Either way, the government's handling of this matter is disgraceful and shows nothing but contempt for the related concerns of B.C. citizens....."
12:30 | [Comment From PaulG] has anyone talked to the woman at the center of this scandal - Ms. hayes? |
12:31 | Mark Hume: Rosemarie Hayes, the director of the government's messaging services, has not talked to anyone in the media. She did talk at some length to a government lawyer, who has filed two affidavits from her. Those sworn statements, which we heard in court are contradictory, are sealed, so we don't know what she's said. |
Premier Gordon Campbell
Martyn Brown, chief of staff
Mike Morton, press secretary
Lara Dauphinee, deputy chief of staff
Ken Dobell, former deputy minister to premier and cabinet secretary
Brenda Eaton, former deputy minister to the premier
Jay Schlosar, former director of issues management
David Cunningham, former deputy communications director
Tom Syer, former deputy chief of staff
Jessica McDonald, deputy minister to the premier
(Ministry of Finance)
Gary Collins, former finance minister
Paul Taylor, former deputy minister
Chris Trumpy, deputy minister
David Morhart, former assistant deputy minister
Yvette Wells, former exec-dir. of the crown agencies secretariat
Judith Reid, former transportation minister
Christy Clark, former deputy premier
Shirley Bond, formed Northern caucus member, minister of education
Richard Neufeld, former northern caucus MLA
(Search of the Legislature on December 28, 2003)
Rich Coleman, former solicitor general
Kevin Begg, assistant deputy minister
(Communications with lobbyists at Pilothouse – Brian Kieran, Erik Bornmann, Jamie Elmhirst and their respective companies)
Christy Clark
Richard Neufeld
Gary Collins
Judith Reid
Paul Taylor
Shirley Bond
"....Former ministerial aides Dave Basi and Bobby Virk are on trial for influence-peddling in relation to the B.C. Rail sale.
One aspect of the case involves the activities of a Victoria lobbying firm run by Brian Kieran and Jamie Elmhirst.
But it's another activity that duo were involved in that caught the attention of the Opposition yesterday. And that was sparked by a rather careless exchange of e-mails four years ago (ie. in 2003) that took an entirely too nonchalant approach to discussing a former deputy minister of finance.
Kieran, Elmhirst and Erik Bornman -- a colleague of theirs then who is expected to be a star witness in the Basi-Virk trial -- were e-mailing one another about a potential new client. This was months before the raid on the legislature and has nothing to do with B.C. Rail.
And if the e-mails are to be believed, then-deputy minister of finance Paul Taylor was only too happy to be of service in facilitating the new business relationship.
At the time Taylor and Kieran were friends and neighbours on Pender Island.
After a day fishing with Taylor, Kieran e-mailed his partners with news that Taylor had given him a detailed outline of how to go about securing a consulting contract with the B.C. Automobile Dealers Association, an outfit that employed Taylor prior to his move to government....."
(insertion of date in bracket above, mine)
Judge Bennett was recently given a government affidavit stating that backup tapes holding e-mail records for the period in question had been deleted. But a second affidavit, filed a few weeks later by the government, states that the records, or some of them, may be intact.
“At this point I am not dealing with whether these documents exist or have been destroyed,” Judge Bennett said in ruling the material is relevant.
George Copley, a government lawyer representing the Premier and cabinet, told court an inventory of electronic data files is being made and “a complete listing of what's available” will be ready on August 17.
