Health Care Reform

Yay!

I support health care reform. Yes, I do. Really. Deaf people who wear hearing aids and cochlear implants need to be supportive of this. Without health insurance, we'll be devoid of our lifestyle.

I learned that the hard way when I lived in Israel. There, I was under health insurance like every other student. However, when I read the fine print when I signed my contract, the health insurance company would not cover any pre-existing conditions. It bothered me a lot at the time because A) I had stress fractures and was hoping to get a bone scan at some point and B) I had cochlear implant that could go haywire anytime. I had to make a vow to do everything possible to keep my CI trouble-free for the next 7 months I was in Israel. Unfortunately, it did go haywire by Month 4 and I had to spend nearly a week all by myself. I had to rely on lipreading and pen-and-paper methods in order to communicate. Otherwise, I avoided people and the Hebrew language at all costs. I had to skip 2 of my Hebrew language classes. I had to sit next to my friend who had her laptop for notes to watch her type in the professor's lecture. It was very hard because I was having a great time in Israel and I didn't want to miss out a minute of my time there. My audiologist in the US had to quickly get it Fedex-ed and get my parents to put it in an ordinary package so it would go through the customs without suspicions. Once I got my new processor, I was a happy camper. My dad had given it a value of $0. I laughed when I saw this... this was a $5,000 specch processor!

Then the following year, I was supposed to spend 6 weeks in Israel for the summer. I did have health insurance and it was the same company as the year before (I was participating in international schools' programs, which offered discounts). So once again, I had to be careful. But I had no idea that Haifa would be that much more humid than Jerusalem so my processor crashed just after I finished my Hebrew course with two weeks left in the trip. I spent a whole week being extremely frustrated with this processor. I tried trouble-shooting on my own. My Israeli "mom" offered to get me an appointment with a doctor she knew near Tel Aviv. I told her that I couldn't because without health insurance, the visit would set me back $400 or more. Yes, 400 smacks for an appointment with a specialist. I just graduated from college and didn't have that kind of money. It was far cheaper for me to take a stand-by on an Air Canada flight for $150. I couldn't get a new processor shipped as I was very worried about the shipping time and customs. So I left the country a week early. I was very sad but I needed to.

This past summer, nothing happened, fortunately. But my audiologist and I had planned on shipping a new processor to me halfway through just to be sure that everything would work throughout the trip. Unfortunately, due to some landlady and moving issues, I needed to leave the country a week early in order to take care of my responsiblities. But at the same time, the processor was coming. Except that it was coming directly from Cochlear, not my parents' house. So it got held up with the customs for at least three weeks. It arrived, barely, just the day before I left on a stand-by. (Fortunately, this program had a different health insurance company that didn't say anything about pre-existing conditions)

So given all these incidents, you can see why I want health insurance reform in this country. I am under my parents' health insurance for so as long I'm a full-time student. I won't be soon. I am still currently under Medicaid, which has been a lifesaver for me and my parents. Medicaid has been absorbing all the costs involved- batteries, appointments, repairs, etc. The only time my parents' insurance company has to pay for is if I want to see my old audiologist in my parents' state, not my state. But once I start an actual job, I may lose Medicaid. I will lose my parents' insurance. And what's left? A) I can hope that my new job's health insurance benefits will cover my pre-existing conditions, or B) I will be left without health insurance so as long companies are not covering these.

Health insurance do not like cochlear implants all that much. They will pay for one and that's it. It's an uphill battle to get them pay for more things like a second cochlear implant or an upgrade (They'll do it if they don't repair your current model anymore). CIs are pricey but they are worth it if they're right for the person's needs and lifestyle. It is for me and it's worth every penny. So I'm always willing to fight every step of the way to be sure that I am covered.

Without health insurance, my quality of life will gradually decrease. Without repairs, without programming visits, my cochlear implant won't substain its quality of sound. It'll get to the point where I will have to live in a silent world. By this I mean, I will not be able to interact with the hearing people as much as I do now. And interacting with hearing people is such strong part of my life that it's incredibly difficult to imagine my life without my interactions with hearing people. I don't want to live in a teeny, tiny little world of Deafness when I know there's a lot out there.