Getting the Best Asthma Care For Your Child
- Monday, September 7, 2009, 12:24
- Asthma
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- Erin:
- Now, going back to the realm of care for the children. Asthma obviously doesn’t go away and may even become worse at a certain point in children’s lives, right?
- Nancy:
- Oh, yes.
- Erin:
- So, how can parents make sure that they’re getting the best medical care for their child, because HMOs, there’s a difficulty in getting referrals to specialists, and many families have to use public health? What would you suggest for parents who are beginning to navigate the system so that they can be advocates for their children?
- Nancy:
- It’s a good question, Erin, and one with not a whole lot of easy answers. The organization helps families do just that in a variety of different ways, but in many cases it’s an individual thing because your HMO rules do change from one years to the next or even your normal health insurance. You find out one year they’re covering your prescriptions 100 percent, the next year, well, it depends on this panel of judges which medications they’re going to cover.
And so, you do have to spend more time trying to navigate your health care system, and parents don’t always have that. We have two-income families and single moms and single dads out there trying their best to make ends meet. It’s not always easy to navigate.
However, if you know what it is that you’re looking for, for example, I knew that I wanted Brooke to be able to sleep through the night without having an asthma attack. I wanted her to go to school and not miss any more days than the next kid. I wanted her to be able to run. I wanted her to be able to ride her bike. I wanted her to be able to spend the night at a friend’s house.
These were all things that I put up at the top of my wish list, and I said to my doctors, every time I met them, “These are the things I want to see happen.”
- Nancy:
- Then that’s where I recommend that every family start, is define your goals and then don’t accept anything less. And if that means you have to slug your way through, do that. Because it’s heartbreaking to talk to families who are denied access to an allergist, or they’ll say to me, “Nancy, I never knew that my child could actually see an allergist because the doctor never suggested we see one. So, I kind of figured, A, I didn’t need one; B, if I really did need one, then, he would have recommended one.”
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