Thanks Terrie! I'll remember your warning about residency though I have seen enough in my clinical training to know that residents can make HUGE mistakes with dire consequences! I'm sorry for your experience!
My statement about socialized medicine stems from an opinion expressed by several physicians that would like a socialized medical program who think that new drugs and technologies are a waste of money for the patient and health care system. Unfortunately, some people here in the U.S. believe that mediocre care for everybody is preferable to the ability to get excellent care when appropriate measures are taken. This faction of people feel that the cheapest drugs should be the mainstay of therapy for everyone and newer drugs should not even be made available. One physician told me he thinks that all people with diabetes should have their therapy based on a regimen of Regular and NPH because they are cheap and well studied and are "adequate" to keep patients from dying. This would eliminate the rapid acting insulin analogues and newer innovations like pramlintide which have made perfect control of blood glucose realistic for thousands of people with diabetes. It terrifies me to think that people want to "dumb down" the medical system and as a consequence, significantly sacrifice the treatment of diabetes and prevention of long-term complications.
Thats a bit of a soap-box and I apologize but I'm a huge fan of medical innovation and feel that my diabetes is in such great control today thanks only to these great advances.
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