Taking the Hell Out of Healthcare

By: Nicholas Jacobs

Narrated by: Mary Ann Jacobs

Mary was admitted to a tertiary hospital for open heart surgery. The surgery did not go well and had to be repeated the following day. Then her physician placed her in a drug-induced coma for 10 days, transferred her to a specialty care hospital for a month where she contracted what could have been a terminal infection, and was placed on 15 different medications that had her in a near vegetative state. These drugs had been prescribed by five different, independent physicians who had not checked the necessary drug interaction information. All of this proved, once again, that the system is broken. We are treating organs, not people. As the patient's advocate, we had Mary weaned from the majority of these dangerous and mostly unnecessary drugs, lobbied for her physical therapy, and helped nurture her back to health. Exactly one year later, she is at her daughter's home and doing just fine.

©2008 F. Nicholas Jacobs (P)2015 F. Nicholas Jacobs