CI Surgery- kids 1st whats your opinion?

T

TAMI SAM

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
230
Reaction score
0
Well turns out Shel was right.I am being made to wait 3 months because they want to operate on kids while schools out. Well do you think this is fair? I can understand that they dont want them missing school ect.But I really want this over with.So do I go in and act like I have no compassion towards a child and demand me first! This is really putting me in a bind as I dont want to be the difficult patient. It does make a difference too believe me.If someone doesnt like you or thinks youre a bitch and you are having a problem they are way less likely to be supportive of you. So whats evryone think is this an ethical thing for the CI practice to do?:whip:
 
I'll probably get blasted for saying this but here goes:

It has something to do with school being out during the summer, but also the medical profession is quick to implant children becasue they believe that's where their greatest chance of success is. They want to have as many kids to parade before the public as possible because it will convince other parents to implant. And no, it isn't fair. Since this is an elective surgery, immediacy should have no effect on who gets implanted when. Its also a surgery that generates a lot of income for the surgeon, the audiologis, and the AVT therapist, so unfortunately, things like that are taken into account.
 
Ummmm...what was I right about? I can't remember...lol!

Anyways, that's a toughie.. What's the ethical thing to do? Keep kids from missing school or giving adults equal treatment?

I am at loss for words on that one.
 
TAMI SAM said:
Well turns out Shel was right.I am being made to wait 3 months because they want to operate on kids while schools out. Well do you think this is fair? I can understand that they dont want them missing school ect.But I really want this over with.So do I go in and act like I have no compassion towards a child and demand me first! This is really putting me in a bind as I dont want to be the difficult patient. It does make a difference too believe me.If someone doesnt like you or thinks youre a bitch and you are having a problem they are way less likely to be supportive of you. So whats evryone think is this an ethical thing for the CI practice to do?:whip:
Click to expand...
when I was approved for surgery from insurance, I didn't get to get implanted in short time, I had to wait for few months to get implanted. I remember when making surgery date with his nurse, I was able to look at my doctor's book and I can see that he's booked solid for all kinds of things like conference, meeting, classes (my surgeon was professor at UofA before he transferred out to Mich. Univ), patient visits and surgeries. He even asked me to wait till Sept instead of June so I can get newer version of implant. I told him nah let's do June since both version has same internal component but has different casing design. I do recall I also had to wait for the CI kits to arrive before I go for surgery after they cancelled my surgery date in April. It has nothing to do with children. If that was actually the case, then the parent may have already booked in advance or your surgeon dr. has lots of clients coming to him long before you did so the priority set in. who knows.

You could use the time to get better like what R2D2 said in your other thread "CI Testing" I don't think it was Shel90 that was right about children. I think it was R2D2 but I don't think that's the case.

I think it is either OR (for any surgery) is booked solid or your surgeon Dr is booked solid (for all kinds not just surgery)

So you have to find available slot in your surgeon's datebook and if he approves then it is set.
 
shel90 said:
Ummmm...what was I right about? I can't remember...lol!

Anyways, that's a toughie.. What's the ethical thing to do? Keep kids from missing school or giving adults equal treatment?

I am at loss for words on that one.
Click to expand...
not you, it was R2D2 that Tami must be referring to... (in CI Testing thread) but R2D2 was referring to Australia not USA
 
TAMI SAM said:
Well turns out Shel was right.I am being made to wait 3 months because they want to operate on kids while schools out. Well do you think this is fair? I can understand that they dont want them missing school ect.But I really want this over with.So do I go in and act like I have no compassion towards a child and demand me first! This is really putting me in a bind as I dont want to be the difficult patient. It does make a difference too believe me.If someone doesnt like you or thinks youre a bitch and you are having a problem they are way less likely to be supportive of you. So whats evryone think is this an ethical thing for the CI practice to do?:whip:
Click to expand...

I would go and talk to them about it and say that you are finding it very difficult and would it be possible to be put on a cancellation list? 3 months is on the longish side but it's not unusual in terms of the experiences that I have noticed on this forum. I waited close to 3 months due to the fact that my surgeon is fairly high profile but my friend only waited a couple of weeks with another surgeon.

I know it's hard. Maybe your surgeons have found that operating in the school holidays is much better because it allows the child to recover in holiday time without missing too many lessons? Also there are a lot of bugs in schools and maybe they want to minimize risks of infection to the child?
 
Tami,

I just had my CI Surgery scheduled, the first choice was just over a month away but the date that I chose was over 2 months away(July). It really depends on the surgeons schedule. I think R2D2 has a good idea about telling the Clinic you would take any cancellations if they came up. You might want to explaing to the surgery coordinator your situation.
 
Is the schedule completely booked and the earliest date for ANYONE is 3 months out, or is that only for adults and they are holding earlier 'spots' open for children that they won't put an adult into?

If you got the first available slot and it is 3 months away, I don't see how that is unfair. If a child made an appointment the same day as you, they would also be scheduled 3 months away too. It's not a matter of putting a child in front of an adult, it's a matter of first come first serve. You probably see a large amount of children on the schedule just because more children get implanted than adults, so it could look like they are playing favorites when really there are just more children getting implants.

However, if they ARE holding spots open, then that would be unfair and I would speak to the implant center.

P.S. Hospitals and doctors do not make out on implant surgeries. I can tell you that of the hospital bills from my daughter's CI surgery in 2001, the primary insurance paid roughly 10% of the charges. In fact, the first implant center we visited had just stopped doing implants because they were losing too much money on them.
 
Tami - it sounds like a bad timing thing too. If you had got your approval three months ago you would have probably gone faster than the children, since the children would have been backlogged to wait for their surgeries until school holidays?

I think your best bet is definitely to ask to get on the cancelation list.
 
I think TAMISAM said in antother thread that the doctors told her they were too busy doing surgery on kids at this point in time.
 
TAMI SAM said:
Well turns out Shel was right.I am being made to wait 3 months because they want to operate on kids while schools out. Well do you think this is fair? I can understand that they dont want them missing school ect.But I really want this over with.So do I go in and act like I have no compassion towards a child and demand me first! This is really putting me in a bind as I dont want to be the difficult patient. It does make a difference too believe me.If someone doesnt like you or thinks youre a bitch and you are having a problem they are way less likely to be supportive of you. So whats evryone think is this an ethical thing for the CI practice to do?:whip:
Click to expand...

Kids first. 6 months extra waiting for a child can make quite a difference in the overall outcome.
For an adult 6 months does not make a difference.

I can imagine you want to get it over with. That's only normal.

But really, you having to wait, means more opportunities for a child that came ahead of you. You're doing them a big favour, even though they don't realise it... Let that the thought that crosses your mind..

Good luck on your operation.. It'll come.
 
I will try to tell you as best I can as husband did talking on phone since I cant hear.I wanted to know how many visits it would take for testing and candicy on CI.Two for the testing and they said "We will not be doing surgery on you for 3 months as our summers are HELD for children.I dont know if this means everything is already booked ,if so,yes I was going to ask for a cancellation. I would NEVER expect special treatment or cut in line BUT if summer's arent booked and they wont book me for 3 months in an open spot just in case a child MIGHT come along well than that sucks! Wont say what it is for sure until I go on the 31st and hear it from the horses mouth. Shel I was refering to you responding to my CI testing thread.
 
It does take a while to do all the tests and see if you are an appropriate candidate. So by the time you get approved you might be either in the middle of school holidays or so (July?). That's better than being approved just before school holidays.

It really does sound like a timing thing to me. The children themselves would also experience delay, depending on when they were approved, since they are slotted into the school holiday period.

Don't worry - it will happen! I know it's hard being patient (been there and done that) In another thread Raykat from New Zealand has to wait probably up to 5 years to get her surgery, so that can put things into perspective sometimes.
 
R2D2 said:
It does take a while to do all the tests and see if you are an appropriate candidate. So by the time you get approved you might be either in the middle of school holidays or so (July?). That's better than being approved just before school holidays.

It really does sound like a timing thing to me. The children themselves would also experience delay, depending on when they were approved, since they are slotted into the school holiday period.

Don't worry - it will happen! I know it's hard being patient (been there and done that) In another thread Raykat from New Zealand has to wait probably up to 5 years to get her surgery, so that can put things into perspective sometimes.
Click to expand...

Wow!! 5 years to wait for surgery!! That's a long time. Did she say why 5 years?
 
Yes, in countries like New Zealand, UK, Canada, Sweden and to some extent Australia they all have socialised medical systems, which means that budget is everything and everyone forms an orderly queue. In some ways its good because no one who needs the medical procedure is turned down because they can't afford it (as in the US). It's free but there is a lot of waiting!

Also, in those countries, children are placed at the front of the queue for CI operations because their operations are deemed more cost effective in the long run than for adults, because of that window of spoken language development.

Here in Australia, we have both private and socialised medicine. So adults here tend to join a health fund (if they haven't already) and get a CI that way rather than wait 3 years. Either way, the government still pays for the actual CI, private health only covers hospital stay.
 
Many doctors are for implant babies/toddlers/children than implant adults with CI.
 
jillio said:
I think TAMISAM said in antother thread that the doctors told her they were too busy doing surgery on kids at this point in time.
Click to expand...

THey probably are, parents may have taken their children in for testing and such and then picked a surgery date during summer break. I've done such things myself. So it wouldn't surprise me if alot of these kids have had their surgery date for a few months.
 
Ci Pkg.

I got my info from the CI office today.Apparently they must always have people who want to know surgery date as they have a pamphlet explaining that no surgery date will be given until all test are completed and evaluated by team and surgeon.Then you will hear from your surgeon with a date. In other words dont even ask.Makes it rough for those who need help or need to take off work but you need them more than they need you i guess. Also for those with children there was a letter enclosed from surgeon that 4 implanted kids got meningitis in UK so make sure you take care of immunization with family DR as they dont do them there.thanks R2D2 and Cloggy I know it'll come,Hearing is getting worse and weirder in "good" ear. hoping I dont go stone cold deaf totally before implant!:pissed:
 
TAMI SAM said:
I got my info from the CI office today.Apparently they must always have people who want to know surgery date as they have a pamphlet explaining that no surgery date will be given until all test are completed and evaluated by team and surgeon.Then you will hear from your surgeon with a date. In other words dont even ask.Makes it rough for those who need help or need to take off work but you need them more than they need you i guess. Also for those with children there was a letter enclosed from surgeon that 4 implanted kids got meningitis in UK so make sure you take care of immunization with family DR as they dont do them there.thanks R2D2 and Cloggy I know it'll come,Hearing is getting worse and weirder in "good" ear. hoping I dont go stone cold deaf totally before implant!:pissed:
Click to expand...

Yes, that sounds about right. I doubt any clinic would give a date before anyone got candidacy approval. Did they give you an approximate idea how long the testing would take? I guess it would vary, according to your circumstances but the routine ones would be Cat scan, MRI, sentence recognition testing, possibly balance testing. Some centres do these all in one day but others do them over a period of time.

And don't worry about your feelings - I remember feeling really impatient to hear again too. I think my clinic probably got sick of me constantly contacting them about timelines and things like that! :)
 
Back
Top