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Inside Out

It won’t change until we make it change

Jeanne Sager
Posted 5/3/22

The trip to Westchester Medical Center takes nearly two hours from my house, especially in the early morning hours when rush hour traffic makes for periods of stop and go.

It’s a trip …

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Inside Out

It won’t change until we make it change

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The trip to Westchester Medical Center takes nearly two hours from my house, especially in the early morning hours when rush hour traffic makes for periods of stop and go.

It’s a trip I’ve taken multiple times in recent weeks, a trip I will need to take at least one more time before I’m released from a specialist’s care.

There are tolls associated with each trip, gasoline to be loaded into my tank at today’s sky high prices, and work lost not just for the time spent with the doctor but for all that travel.

I’m one of the lucky ones.

Despite requiring surgery, my health issues are relatively minor and have been fully resolved within a short period of time.

My health insurance has taken on a sizeable portion of the burden of the medical bills.

I have my own vehicle which is able to make extended trips, and when necessary my husband’s employer has been more than willing to accommodate his time off to drive me to and from the hospital.

My own employer has likewise been flexible and honored my need to put my health first. They also employ a carryover plan for sick days, which means I was able to draw on leftover days from the year before, rather than completely depleting my store of paid time off in the first half of the year.

All of this puts me at an advantage over some 24 percent of Americans with no sick time at all and the 57 percent who have sick days but whose sick days are lost as their employment year rolls over.

Perhaps most importantly, it puts me at an advantage over the 58 percent of Americans who delay important medical care because of costs, travel barriers and lack of time. And we wonder why rural counties in America have the highest rural death rates, far exceeding those in suburban or urban areas?

Most people don’t have the time, money, or support to travel two hours each way to a hospital over and over and over again to take care of their health.

These are factors that played in my head on each two hour ride in each direction in recent weeks. What if I was like so many other people? What if I had to live with my condition because I couldn’t access help? What if my condition were life threatening, and not having all the advantages I have cost me my life?

What if is a game I tend to play much to my husband’s chagrin, but I’ve found it helps me put my own life in perspective and makes me more empathetic to others’ plights.

It’s also one that tends to send me down rabbit holes looking for answers.

How do we fix a problem that costs our neighbors their lives?

While I don’t have ready answers to solve it all, one thing that’s come to light is a New York State standard that’s woefully inadequate. It’s required that health insurance companies ensure that it includes providers that are within a 30 minute drive of one’s home in an insured’s network — but only in urban and suburban areas. Rural areas are completely sold out, with standards stating directly, “In rural areas, transportation may exceed these standards if justified.”

It gets worse when specialist care, the kind that sends so many county residents out of the county — is necessary. For this, the state department of health only suggests a 30 miles or 30 minutes option be offered, but it provides no requirement whatsoever — not even for the suburbs or cities. There’s likewise no stipulation that these health insurance companies need to pay travel costs or make up for lost wages for sending patients hours from home each time they require help.

Rural people die because they cannot access care. The grim statistics show us this.

But the very companies that will gladly accept our hard-earned cash with a promise of providing necessary healthcare don’t do anything to bridge that gap.

And until the government requires it, they won’t.

We need their help, and it’s up to us as citizens to call upon them for it.

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