Posts Tagged ‘healthy NY’

Pets and Allergies

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

Pets and allergies for some reason seem to go together. How sad when you have a family and everyone agrees they all want very much to add a pet to the family and when you do the war of the allergies takes over. The allergies stem from the animal dander and not all the health insurance in the world is going to stop this from happening.

However, there are some allergies, like asthma, that are now considered a pre-condition. If your child or children are developing an allergy to the pet dander, do you then return the pet? Probably not, but this is becoming an issue for the health care industry to pay attention to. There are a few steps you can try to help alleviate this issue with the help of the health insurance community.

1.    Discuss the allergy symptoms with your medical health care physician

2.    Bathe your pet regularly to reduce the pet dander

3.    Refrain from allowing your pet to enter the bedroom for an allergy free night

4.    Thoroughly vacuum carpeting and flooring regularly

5.    Clean and dust regularly

6.    Consider using a vacuum with a HEPA filter to pick up pet dander

First, you must figure out how to relieve the symptoms of the allergy and this is a logical topic to discuss with your medical health care physician.

There are many over the counter medications that are mild that you could try to see if they eliminate the itchy eyes and runny nose after consulting your medical health care physician. However, if the one member of your home who is allergic to pet dander is a child, it is a wise idea to discuss this with your pediatrician. If your child is older then discuss this with your medical physician and even your affordable health insurance carrier.

Sometimes you will need a prescription medication for allergies, specific to pet dander and then you will need to talk with your health insurance provider to find out if they will cover the prescription. The reason why you need to find out is that if the prescription is an expensive one, you must continue to purchase a new supply each month.

Always take care though, do not mix medications when you are not sure if they are compatible. You can always consult your medical health care physician when you are not sure, especially when children are involved. You can also consult with your low cost health insurance provider to ask if they have a pamphlet for more advice to protect the children and reduce the susceptibility of pet dander allergen.

The health insurance providers usually have information they will be more than happy to pass along to you to help with the necessary adjustments of introducing a new pet into the home. Good, sound advice is what you really need most right now and they just might have what you are searching. Once you are able to grasp a new workable system you will soon find the allergy will begin to subside, but never allow yourself to let down your guard.

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Lower Insurance Premiums

Monday, April 12th, 2010

Shopping around for medical health care is so time consuming that many people who begin with good intentions end by walking away and giving up. However, if you prepare ahead of time and have a better understanding of what you are looking for the search becomes easier.  There are a few things you can list and then take them one by one until you locate the right health insurance plan that will suite your needs.

It is at this time that you will pick up the telephone and set up an in office appointment to discuss the details further and collect some information. A few of the ways to lower your medical health insurance premiums are:

1. Always do your best to remain healthy and refrain from unsavory habits

2. If you are a smoker now it a great time to stop

3. Consider a high deductible in order to lower the average monthly cost for health insurance

4. Change your co-insurance ratio when it is possible

5. Consider combining a Health Savings Account or HSA with a high deductible medical health insurance plan for better planning

6. Consider a major medical catastrophic plan to help defray cost

7. Consider eliminating anything that poses a significant risk

8. Consider a health insurance plan with an in network medical physician

9. When both spouses have group health insurance through their place of employment discuss which insurance plan covers more for less money

10.                   Go over your insurance plan annually to check for any changes to the policy

11.                   When you are dissatisfied with your employer sponsored group health insurance add a suggestion in the suggestion box

12.                   Try to be pre-emptive and think ahead for what your family needs will be

These are all suggestions to help you when you make that appointment with a health insurance provider in order for you to receive the type of insurance policy that will best serve you and your family. In turn, doing your homework also aids the insurance provider put together and offer you an insurance policy that is closest to what you are searching. One of the high sides is when you and your spouse are both employed.

When you both carry medical health insurance coverage, it does give you the opportunity to find the time and compare both medical health insurance policies to see which one really costs less and offers more beneficial coverage at the same time. This will afford you the opportunity to drop the health care plan that cost more while continuing with beneficial coverage for yourself, your spouse, and your children.

Try not to focus so hard on the cost because it is the coverage that will be more valuable as the years pass. When you have the responsibility of a family, children continue to grow, and there are always different issues regarding health insurance issues that must be addressed. When you only focus on the average monthly cost for health insurance, you may be hurting yourself and your family rather than helping them.

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Is New York following Massachusetts

Friday, March 26th, 2010

The health care process in New York has been on the revamping slide for a few years now. With Massachusetts as a role model, New York has investigated and kept a close eye on how the implemented health care reform measures have been working. At the same time, they have been instituting some of the health care measures within the state health care system as well.

Although not to the extent that Massachusetts has, for the time being it is working. For how long this system will continue to function positively is anyone’s guess. To continuously take in more applicants on all levels and have so few paying into the system is a system that will fail. This is what is happening in Massachusetts at this present time. The low cost health insurance that was promised in the beginning is slowly getting much more expensive driving more people to leave the state.

Yes, they too celebrated when State wide nationalized health care was instituted for all the citizens, but they all forgot to factor in who was going to pay for the process to continue and flourish. Today, they are floundering in a sea of red tape because the funds are scarce and growing scarce with each passing day.

Many residents fled Massachusetts for neighboring states, and today you could say they were the lucky ones. Ah, but New York is a completely new ballgame. Universal health care is a very bold and thoughtful ideal, but that is where it begins and ends.

This ideal of all for one and one for all is a utopian ideal that is not sustainable. You must have more money coming in than is going out, any business in the New York area already know that. Why does the state of New York think it do a better job of health insurance provisions than other states?

Then to consider mandating, as Massachusetts did, that all residents living and working in the New York area must comply.  The state of New York, like the state of Massachusetts really has no business in trying to run a universal health care plan when they understand very little of the concept. We already have failed government programs that are going broke at a rapid rate:

1.    Medicaid Insurance and Medicare Insurance

2.    Social Security

These are all going broke and for the same reason. There is more money being paid out to recipients, than taken in by those who participate in these plans. When did it ever say that every one is entitled to everything free? This is really unfortunate for those within the health care system that really do need it or they will not survive. There are others within the health care system that can most assuredly take care of themselves, but for some reason it is so much easier to put a hand out instead.

When are individuals going to understand that although help is out there for those who truly are in need, the mass majority can be quite self-sufficient? There are many in New York who understands this and they go through great lengths to take care of their own.

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Sports Injuries the Average Non- Professional Can Claim

Monday, January 25th, 2010

No doubt athletes get injured all the time. Some of these injuries are minor such as a sprained ankle, but other injuries can be quite substantial causing serious injuries, disability, and death.  Sports injuries can broaden into various fields.  If you watch the TV show Dancing With The Stars and the show. So You Think You Can Dance, you will have noticed that even dancers are subject to ankle and hip injuries. The importance of health insurance coverage, personal injury liability insurance, and more is crucial for keeping these shows in operation.

What is to be noted as well is that because we all know that participating in any kind of sport has becomes a risk, sports players or participants in a sport even as seemingly innocuous as dancing is a risk. People who participate in these activities are said to have given their consent to level of risk involved.  In other word, they may not be covered for their injuries and their health care needs are in jeopardy.

That is in and of itself a hard pill to swallow.  You agree to dance, where did it it become necessary sign on the dotted line saying you agree to sustain injuries at your own risk? While the courts battle out what claims will be honored and which ones won’t; the bottom line still remains that individuals should carry health insurance to protect themselves against injuries sustained while participating in a sport; even one such as dancing, which is not generally looked upon as a sport in the first place.

In America, it would be foolhardy not to be responsible for our own health care.  One never knows when a sport related injury will occur.  We do not have to be a professional athlete to sustain injuries just going through the process of daily living can present some situations where accidents can occur. Of course, walking down the stairs and falling and would not be considered a sport’s injury. If the property belonged to someone else and you fell because the pathway was obstructed, that is a personal injury, which you can claim from the property owner’s insurance company, but it is not a sports injury. There are other situations; however, which would be considered a sports injury.

You do not have to be a professional or semi professional athlete to sustain injuries and be able to make a personal injury claim.  Health care coverage is important for professional and amateur alike.  These situations would include:  Team sports, motivation and team building exercises, exercise classes in community centers, swimming, injuries sustained in fitness clubs and gymnasiums, injuries sustained in military training exercises, and in school and university physical education classes.

The list does not stop there as you also can include motor sports of any kind including car racings boating and off terrain vehicle sporting, winter activities such as skiing, skating, snow shoeing and skidoo riding, and other outdoor summer activities such as horseback riding, bicycling, hiking, and climbing.  The potential list for places and activities is endless.

It is important to note that physical injuries sustained through normal playing of a sport may not be eligible for claim by most health insurance companies. Neither are errors in judgment on the part of the player, which led to the injury, such as not wearing proper protective gear. However there are still exceptions where claims can be made.

You will be entitled to claim if your injury was caused by a dangerous defect on the surface that you are playing on, such as a tile missing that caused you to fall or trip, and a stage that is warped and caused an injury while you performed your dance, or exercise. If the equipment you needed to use was defective such as when a child injured on a broken swing or trampoline this too can be considered a legitimate claim.

Negligence on the part of a referee, coach, or team instructor did to insure player’s safety could be cause for a legitimate health insurance claim.   You can also file a claim if: the instructor gave incorrect instructions on how to carry out the activity resulting in an injury, if there was little or no supervision in a public sport, if the players were rough and caused the injury and the facility or the equipment was not maintained. An example of the latter might to be running in the school gymnasium and tripping over a ball that should not have been there or a piece of paper on the floor and so on.

Make sure you are covered and avoid the hassles when sporting establishments refuse to compensate forcing you to pay out of pocket for health care expenses.

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Longest Running Study into Aging and Dementia Renewed for 5 More Years!

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

The ACT study was recently awarded a grant of twelve million dollars from the National Institute on Aging so that it can continue its work for the next five years.  This group has been running a study for the past twenty-three years, which is the longest study of its kind.

Every couple years more than 2,000 senior aged health patients check in with the ACT program for monitoring, questions, and helpful advice.  This group is being monitored for the onset of late Alzheimer’s disease and Dementia and is the largest ongoing group in history to be studied.

Because this group has a dedicated group of patients and leading scientists, plus a superb staff backing it, they are able to learn what their research subjects value as they grow older.  The study is to help people find the best approach to meeting their needs to help them age well.  This means often promoting independent living and providing them with the coping skills necessary to deal with any problems that arise.

The patients are monitored bi-annually so that the team can observe how the patients walk and do many other mental and physical tasks.  The observation monitoring also includes a selected group of questions that the patients are asked to answer.  Some of these questions include whether or not the patient will allow an autopsy on their brains after they have passed on.  Because of this study and patients willing to undergo the autopsy, the team has learned how blood flow and vascular disease affects late life Alzheimer’s and dementia diseases.  They found that injuries that affect blood flow and the blood vessels carrying the blood could be instrumental in late onset brain problems in older people.

This group is planning to spend the next five years worth of funding looking deeper into the findings of their recent studies so that they can determine just how much damage to the blood vessels can trigger the brain to decline through micro-infarcts and what physical activities, if any, can be done to counteract the affects.  The group is hoping to find ways to keep people’s minds healthier and disease free.

So far, this study group has learned that in order to keep the mind healthy and reduce the late onset diseases like Alzheimer’s and dementia, one requires regular exercise which reduces the risk.  They have learned that when people cannot walk normally and proceed at a slower pace it is a prelude to these two diseases.

Studies of this type have also led to changes in the way that patients with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease are cared for and assisted with the burdens these specific diseases cause.  These studies have proved that various drugs, especially sedatives, can cause falling and confusion in these patients.  Drugs that are used to treat high cholesterol can linked to changes in the brain, especially in Alzheimer patients.  Anti-oxidants do not seem to prevent the brain from declining, although regularly consuming fruit and vegetable juices do reduce the risk.  Avoiding environmental toxins assists in the brain not declining as quickly.  Wearing shoes, not slippers etc, prevents these patients from falling in their homes and disturb sleeping complicates the patients life and makes them and their families deal with increased agitation in the patients.

This great study group recruits around 240 new patients each year to replace patients that have passed away or withdrawn from the program for one reason or another, so that their numbers always remain constant around the 2000 mark.  This group was founded in 1947, and is still doing great work in research in 2009.

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Other Medical Complications That Affect The Health Care of Diabetics

Monday, October 19th, 2009

High blood pressure

About 73% of diabetics suffer from high blood pressure.

Blindness

Up to 24,000 new cases of blindness is reported every year and this is due to a disease called diabetic retinopathy.  High blood sugars damage the nerves in the retina.

Kidney disease

The number one cause of kidney failure is diabetes.

Nervous system disease

Up to 70 percent of people suffering from diabetes also have some form of damage to the nervous system.  This damage could include slow digestive systems, carpal tunnel syndrome, and lack of sensation in the legs and feet.

Amputations

People with diabetes have a 10 times greater chance of having their legs or feet amputated.  This is caused by excessively high blood glucose levels, which can cause infection in wounds or slow up the healing process allowing the opportunity for gangrene to set in.

Dental problems

Tooth decay and gum disease is common among diabetes victims. In addition, high levels of sugar in the saliva will create problems as well.

Sexual dysfunction

Impotence, and other sexual dysfunctions in both men and women are common

Many more complications can result from diabetes and improper health care.

In 2007 $27 billion dollars was spent on medical expenses for diabetics.  The costs are rising by 8 billion dollars each year.  Health insurance companies are overburdened, which in turn trickles down to the insured that must pay higher premiums.  Then there is more government expenditures including disease related unemployment disability, and in the private sector, we have employers who end up with higher absentee rates among their workers who have diabetes.

Diabetes does not only affects the individual suffering with it, it affects families, government, health insurance companies, employers and more.  The epidemic is overpowering our culture and needs to be curtailed.

For those people who need help, make sure you do see your doctor, if you are obese and have not been testing for diabetes get the test immediately before complications set in.  If you are overweight it is always good to get testing in case you are in the pre diabetic stage.  Eat a sensible low carbohydrate, low sugar and fat diet, exercise and stay on your meds. Your health care is important not only to you but to your family and friends and America as well.

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The Diabetes Crisis in America is on the Rise

Friday, October 16th, 2009

It has long been known that the obesity epidemic in America today will cause all kinds of medical complications and a drain on the medical system due to rising health care costs.  The expanding waistlines of Americans reaches far beyond aesthetics, it is a national health disaster.  Obesity is the known factor in type 2 diabetes, also called sugar diabetes or diabetes mellitus. Diabetes mellitus or onset adult diabetes mellitus generally hits a person who is obese and over forty years of age.

Each year new cases of diabetes mellitus are reported in America.  More and more patients flock to their doctors and are put on medications to control their blood sugar levels.  Actually the crises is not isolated to America, as Canadian and UK medical experts report alarming increases in reported cases of type 2 diabetes as well. Almost 8 percent of the American population has diabetes and that translates to 23 million people. These cases are taxing the health insurance companies with various claims. According to the American Diabetes Association, there are still 5.7 million people who remain undiagnosed, and still another whooping 57 million people who are in the pre-diabetic stage.   Over 11 million women have diabetes and do not have any idea that they do.  Over 12 million men have diabetes.  Also, certain races are more prone to diabetes than others.  These groups include: Hispanic and Latino Americans, American Indians, African Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Islander women. Furthermore the health care of children is compromised. There are more cases of children and adolescents who are now getting type 2 diabetes, which, was once considered an adult onset disease.

There are several serious health care complications for diabetics. For example, there are 65 percent of deaths resulting from heart attack or stroke. Adult diabetics are at a two to for times higher risk to contract heart disease than the non-diabetic population.  Stroke is another common complication from diabetes and diabetics are also at a 2 to 4 percent higher chance of getting a stroke with nearly 3 percent higher chance of dying from it.

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The Cost of Obesity on the American Health Care System

Thursday, June 25th, 2009

American cooking it is good. Some people would go as far as to say that no better food can be found anywhere on the planet.   However despite as good as American cooking may be, are Americans eating healthy? The fact is the way Americans eat is causing a health crisis at this time.  All those pastries, and fried foods are literally killing us.  Though it is true that traditional homemade cooking like biscuits and brown gravy has been a main staple in many American homes of the past, the rate of obesity was not as alarming as it is today.  The American lifestyle has changed over the years.  Many homemakers of today also work outside the home and have less time to produce traditional hearty and healthy meals.

More and more Americans are eating out at fast food restaurants or ordering restaurant food in home rather than cooking their own. Greasy fast foods such as French fries and hamburgers, fried chicken, and pizza are affecting the general health of Americans.  In fact most fast foods whatever they may be are saturated with cholesterol. Bad cholesterol - LDL-C is responsible for weight gain and medical conditions including obesity, kidney failure, hypothyroidism, Cushing disease, and more.

Take the bad eating habits of Americans, lack of exercise, and sedentary lifestyles and you have a recipe for disaster. America is an overweight nation and despite the media coverage and warnings given out by various health groups, the situation is not about to change in the near future. Furthermore, approximately 80 percent of the nation’s doctors do not offer dietary services, citing that lack of funds is a major deterrent for the services at this time.

Congress is currently looking at different ways to reform the health care system and they are concerned about the nutrition and dietary needs of Americans.  They are taken the warning from physicians seriously that preventative measures will curtail the possibility of chronic disease resulting from poor eating habits.  Several organizations including the WHO (World Health Association), the American Dietetic Association, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institutes of Health, all agree that obesity is a chronic disease.

To date the US health care system treats diseases related to obesity but does not recognize obesity as the cause of these various diseases. It does not treat obesity as a disease on its own. Yet millions of Americans are obese and do go to the doctors for various diseases such as type II diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, and metabolic syndrome for treatment and medication.

The American Sports Data organization stipulates that the obesity stats were measured at 13 percent in 1962, and by 2000, it has grown to 31 per cent. According to the body mass index, 63 percent of Americans are overweight (over the 25.0 index), and 31 percent are actually obese (over the 3.0 index).  More alarming still, is that childhood obesity is over three times higher than it was just twenty years ago.

Most of the research stats documented are primarily focused on body mass.  Looking at actually body weight, according to the recent findings by IHRSA/ASD Obesity Weight Control Report, they concur that American population is overweight.  They cite that over 3.8 million Americans are presently overweight, with 400,000 individual reaching over 400 pounds. These stats are of epidemic proportions.  The average American woman weight in at 163 pounds indicating that the average American woman is not physically fit and is running the risk of future health problems.

If the stats continue at this rate of growth, the situation with hit crises levels; with about half of all Americans becoming overweight or obese in the next few decades. As it stands, the Surgeon General Report points to 300,000 deaths resulting from obesity related diseases in America each year.

The Centers for Disease Control and prevention cite that chronic diseases of which obesity is included are responsible for a whooping 75 percent of the 2 trillion dollars that the USA is currently paying for health care every year.

Besides the health risks for obese individuals, there is a strain on the health care system and the health insurance companies are also feeling the strain.  Obese people are in a higher risk category than a healthy person and therefore use the benefits more than others.  What this does is to jack up the insurance premiums for all insurers and they are far too high as it is.  Also, some health insurance companies will charge higher premiums for the obese individuals while others will not insure them at all.

Everyone is effective by this growing obesity crisis. It is not limited to obese people.  Average-weight Americans are footing the bill in many cases. All segments of society must intervene to make a healthier America.  Governments, researchers, health care professionals, health insurers, media, social aid, social activist groups, the fast food industry, family, friends and the obese themselves must pool together to find solutions to this growing problem before we eat ourselves to death.

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