URGENT ACTION NEEDED - CALL NOW!

Your calls are needed to keep single payer amendments alive in the U.S. House of Representatives. The message is simple:

"Keep the Kucinich Amendment!"

 

• Speaker Nancy Pelosi:
  
  DC 202.225.4965 - SF 415.556.4862
  
  
  
• Representative George Miller:
  
  DC 202.225.2095 - Concord 925.602.1880
  
  
• Representative Henry Waxman:
  
  DC 202.225.3976 - LA 323.651.1040
  
  
  
  
• Read the National Nurses Blog Post

And don't forget to rec up the dKos diary and leave a comment thanking them for all the National Nurses Movement does if you are a member there. 

guest post by Ludlow

I've been a critical care nurse for 12 years. I rarely find out about the costs my patients incur as they get care in my unit, though occasionally I hear figures. One gentleman, who had open heart surgery to fix one of his heart valves had to come back 3 months later for a re-do. His wife told me that they had just received the bills that added up to almost $200,000. That was about 8 years ago.

Not long ago I learned that the charge per day in intensive care units like mine was now $11,000. Not unrelated to that fact, just the other day, one of our patients who was a 'self pay' (read 'no insurance') was quickly and quietly packed up and transferred to the county hospital for the remainder of her critical care stay which was going to be several days.

Thanks for reminding us Jim, as always, of those out there doing the good work for our veterans - standingup

Many of us, especially Veterans who are Advocates for our brothers and sisters and those Civilians who join that advocacy, have been writing about the Veterans Administration and especially Veterans Care, which in these times of conflicts also encompass the Military Care system as well. With this technology we can push our advocacy untill it's paid the attention it should already have by those who do the job of reporting as a profession. And because of the extreme lack of oversight and concern by the representatives we hire, as the drums of war were first pounding and the years following, we find breaking stories far to often in these last months. Months that have brought out the problems with the care, the overwelming numbers needing care and being denied for months or just denied, the living conditions of those receiving the care and even serving, and so much more.

When we write about the needs or the lack oversight and funds we far to often, myself included though I try and remember in my rage, leave out the facts of the true dedication of the workers in the VA System. The workers, who like most of us working stiffs, give their all to the jobs and professions they perform and have to deal with what's lacking from the administrations, top on down, of these agencies. In the government that administration starts with the Executive Branch, the Congress, the Political Appointee's to head and the Political Appointee's they bring in, and Especially to the Governed, Us, who fight the costs needed or follow political ideology leadership if not wanted.

Every once in awhile a report will surface of that dedication within: