6 Months Minus One Day : #welovethenhs

Six months ago, at this very moment, I was sleeping in a single bed. My girlfriend was sleeping on a mattress on the floor  at the end of the bed.

We were in a room in The Heart Hospital, London, and I was around ten hours away from a porter taking me down to the operating theatres, where a team of surgeons and doctors and nurses and probably a few other people would carry out what I am lead to understand was a seven hour operation to replace my aortic valve with a mechanical one.

Clearly – by the fact I am writing in this diary – I made it through the operation, and through the recovery period in the hospital, and through the recovery period at home and through the recuperation back to my pre-operation life. 

Of course, before I had the surgery, my heart didn’t tick, and now it does. What with it being a mechanical valve, it clicks every time it opens and closes. And I have to take warfarin every night to avoid clots building up on the valve. But – on the whole – I am fit, I am healthy and I am not going to need any more operations (which given I have had three already is probably a good thing), so the months of pain and discomfort really were worth it.

But while all of that is important back story, it is not the point of this entry. Because I am just one person, and while my story is important (because society is made up individuals, so the life of one person – the rights, health and general well being of that one person – is just as important as the rights, health and general well being of society as a whole),and while the rest of this entry is also about my story, there is a whole other part of this that far more interesting (to me at least) and far more important as a whole.

Last night,  I saw an advert on TV. I can’t remember the exact wording, but essentially it went like this :-

A voice over artist asks : What makes a good health provider?

Then we get a series of children (apparently of every race, creed and colour) giving their answers :-

One that makes my mummy better so she can help me with my rocket

One that makes my daddy not fall over so much

One that takes care of me when I am ill

One that has nice rooms and play areas

One that looks after my gran so she can come home and looka fter me

One that makes my granddad feel better after he was ill

At the end, it says "BUPA – your choice for (something – I kind of stopped paying attention at that point)"

It painted a lovely, rosy picture of a health service provider that everyone would love and adore.

What I would like to see is the last few kids :-

One that is free at the point of service so daddy doesn’t have to work two jobs to pay for mummy’s care

One that is available to anyone, no matter whether they can afford the treatment or not

One that is not based on ability to pay, but need 

But somehow I don’t think that BUPA is ever going to put that in their adverts, because – lets face it – that’s not what BUPA is about. They are there to make a profit, pure and simple. In much the same way that every other private medical provider is there to make money.

And somehow they have managed to project the image that private medical treatment must be better than the NHS, because if you are paying for something, you expect it to be better than what you get for free.

("You get what you pay for" is a very old adage, but while in a few cases it is true, in the vast majority of cases is it a lie, through and through).

I turned 40 just over a month before my operation, and in the whole of my forty years I have never once had to pay for my treatment at the point of service. Yes – I pay taxes. Quite a lot of taxes actually, but since I earn enough to warrant paying those taxes I don’t mind. As a wise man once said – it is the only way to make the country work, and – since I am apparently going to need medical care my whole life, it is in my best interest that the best people can go to medical school, not just those that can afford it, and that the police, fire brigade, ambulance services and other national, public services are fully funded, even if some of the people who use them can not afford to fund them.

I turned 40 just over a month before my operation, and in those 40 years I had two major operations, five minor operations and several hundred days in hospital for check ups, scans and other such medical things. And not once did I have to pay any of those things directly. Not once did I have to pay to ensure my health was okay. 

And in all that time, I have never had a single complaint about my treatment. I have been treated with respect, with kindness, with care. I have been looked after by world class doctors, surgeons and consultants. I have never had to wait excessive times for an appointment – in fact, this last operation was scheduled in January but I asked for it to be put back until March because I needed time to sort stuff out at work, and they agreed without hesitation. 

I have never once felt like a "customer" – I have always felt like a patient. I have never felt like I was being treated at their convenience, but that they were looking after me based on my requirements.

In short – in the 15,000 days I have been under the care of the NHS, I have never had a single day where I thought I could do better.

I have to admit that my knowledge of healthcare prices in the US and UK is pretty sketchy. So all of what I am about to quote are pretty much estimates, based on random guess work. So if you are going to take me to task over them, don’t bother because I know they are just estimates.

My health care costs :-

Three major operations – all open heart surgery, all lasting a fair while, one when I was a child.

Estimated costs (based on random google search) – around £75k each.

Five minor operations – related to my heart condition.

Estimated costs – around £30k to £50k each

Around 100 to 150 hospital consultations

Estimated costs – around £50 to £100 each

Around 30 to 40 days in hospital (post operations)

Estimated costs – around £1k each

Post operative pain medications (not in hospital, but on prescription)

Estimate costs – £1 to £2 each 

Total costs 

3 * £75k = £225,000

5 * £40k = £200,000

150 * £75 = £11,250

40 * £1k = £40,000

2000 * £1.50 = £3,500

Now – keep in mind this doesn’t include the Warfarin I now take daily, nor does it include incidental expenses that might have come up, nor does it include the costs of accommodation for my parents (in the earlier years) and my girlfriend (this last time). Nor does it include any other sickness or doctors visits I have had that were not related to my surgery. Nor does it include the two ambulance rides I have required in my life. 

So – the total cost comes out at around £479,450 for treatment related to my heart condition. 

My family is

not poor, but the idea that – with three young children and my mother taking a break from work to raise us – they could have afforded that much is beyond reason.

And even though I am not poor, the idea that I could afford that is also beyond reason. 

Now — I know what you are going to say :- that I can pay health insurance premiums, some of which can be relatively inexpensive, so I would not have to cough up the whole whack in one go. 

But what if I was unemployed? What if I didn’t have a job? What if I had a minimum wage job working as a shelf-stacker somewhere? What if I had a zero-hour contract job so that I didn’t know if I would be employed from one day to the next? 

In short – what if – by the grace of the gods, the grace of fate – I did not have the job I have now, and the financial stability I have now?

No health insurance, no way to pay for the treatments. What would my choices be then? Go MASSIVELY in to debt so that I can continue to live? Or just accept that – because I am poor, with no money and no hope – that I deserve to die?

Socialised medicine is not evil. Socialised medicine is not the work of Satan. Social medicine is not bad or wrong.

We do not have DEATH PANELS that decide whether people should live or die based on what it would cost to support them.

We do have one of, if not the, best Health Care Services in the world. One that is free at the point of use, one that anyone, no matter their status, can use when they need it.

One that – if we do not stand up for it – we will lose forever.