OT - Proposed Mastectomy Law Change

Well worth the 30 seconds it took me to sign.......see the link at the end of this e-mail.

Proposed Mastectomy Law Change   (written by a surgeon)   I'll never forget the look in my patients eyes when I had to   tell them they had to go home with the drains, new exercises and no breast. I remember begging the Doctors to keep these women in the hospital longer, only to hear that they would, but their hands were tied  by the insurance companies.   So there I sat with my patient giving them the  instructions they needed to take care of themselves, knowing full well they didn't grasp half of what I was saying, because the glazed, hopeless, frightened look spoke louder than the quiet 'Thank you' they muttered.   A mastectomy is when a woman's breast is removed in order to remove cancerous breast cells/tissue. If you know anyone who has had a  mastectomy, you may know that there is a lot of  discomfort and pain afterwards. Insurance companies are trying to make mastectomies an  outpatient procedure. Let's give women the chance to recover properly in the hospital for 2 days after surgery.   Mastectomy Bill in Congress it takes 2 seconds to do this and is very important .. please take the time and do it really quick! Breast Cancer Hospitalization Bill - Important  legislation for all women.   Please send this to everyone in your address book. If there was ever a time when our voices and choices should be heard, this is one of those times. If you're receiving this, it's  because I think you will take the 30 seconds to go to vote on this issue and send it on to others you know who will do the same.   

There's a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient  Protection Act which will require insurance companies to cover a minimum 48-hour  hospital stay for patients undergoing a mastectomy. It's about eliminating the 'drive-through mastectomy' where women are forced to go home just a few hours after surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from anesthesia and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached.   Lifetime Television has put this bill on their web  page with a petition drive to show your support. Last year over half the House signed on.  PLEASE!! Sign the petition by clicking on the web site below. You need not give more than your name and zip code number.    http://www.lifetimetv.com/health/breast_mastectomy_pledgehtml   This takes about 2 seconds. PLEASE PASS THIS ON to your friends

This has a great sentiment behind it - but it has been going around the internet for years.

Check this out : http://www.snopes.com/politics/medical/mastectomy.asp

 

 

Desperate Housewives" star Marcia Cross joined Lifetime, Senator Landrieu (D-LA) and Representatives DeLauro (D-CT) and Moran (R-KS), at a Capitol Hill press conference on Wednesday, January 23, to give voice to the 20 million signatures collected on myLifetime.com urging Congress to end the practice of “drive-through” mastectomies, when women are forced to leave the hospital following their physically and emotionally difficult breast cancer surgeries before they and their doctors may feel they are ready to go home. Senator Landrieu and Representatives DeLauro and Moran are championing the bipartisan Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2007 (S.459/H.R 758), whi*****ludes no mandates but allows a woman and her doctor to decide if she is best off going home or staying in the hospital for at least 48 hours after having a mastectomy.

Thank you for bringing this important topic up.  I have not yet gone to the site and signed but I will.  I did just want to give you ladies a heads up however.  I have signed this petition for at least 4 different organizations since I was diagnosed, before I was diagnosed I know I had signed it when someone had emailed me the info.  My point is,  this legislation was first introduced in 1997 by  Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLouro(sp)  and although she has reintroduced it many times it has alway languished in committees and never been brought to a vote on the floor.  It has effectively been killed each year at the end of the session because no action has been taken.  Sign the petitions if you want but the real effort needs to be made to send letters, and make phone calls to your local, state and federal reps.  Our voices need to be heard loud and clear that we are not going to be ignored any more.  There is not much doubt in my mind that the insurance companies lobby extensively to keep this Act tied up in committees.  If it never comes to a vote, no House or Congressional leader has to take responibility for defeating it.  Since being diagnosed I now vote according to how the candidates stand on health and cancer related issues.  If we are loud enough we will be heard.  It really is not all that many years ago that the insurance companies were forced to pay for an annual screening mammogram for women 40 and over.  Make a committment today to contact your reps and I believe we can make this happen.  Yes there are women who want to go home early, but there are many that would stay if they had the option. God bless all of us in this miserable battle.  We should not have to be making this argument eleven years after it was first introduced.