Thursday - November 24, 2005

No Surgery For Fat People

In case you ever wondered what lies down the dark road of national health care, look no further than our friends in the UK. Now they’re refusing surgery for obese people, or at least those with a body mass index (BMI) over 30 (which rules me out fer sure). This means that if you lived in the UK and fractured a hip, you would not be operated on until your BMI had been checked and approved. Do any of you recall who tried to ram national health care and socialized medicine down our throats back in the early 1990’s? I can’t seem to recall her name but I think it was “HIL” something or other ....

Obese Patients Denied Operations
SUFFOLK, UK (BBC)

Obese people are to be denied some surgical procedures in a bid to cut costs in the NHS. Three Suffolk primary care trusts have ruled patients with a body mass index (BMI) over 30 will not get operations like hip and knee replacements. A person of average weight would have an BMI of between 18.5 and 24.9.

Dr Brian Keeble, a director of Ipswich PCT said: “We cannot pretend that this work wasn’t stimulated by pressing financial problems.” Under new guidelines surgery will not be performed unless “the patient has a body mass index below 30 and conservative means have failed to alleviate the patient’s pain and disability”.

“Pain and disability should be sufficiently significant to interfere with the patient’s daily life and/or ability to sleep.” Hospital consultants and GPs in East Suffolk came up with a list of 10 conditions for which there must be a threshold in order for surgery to be performed. Included in the procedures for which there are conditions are such things as varicose veins and grommets for glue ear in children.

Dr Keeble said: “Our work on clinical thresholds has been a key part of this process. “We started from the idea that operating on some conditions, either at an early stage or before other treatments have been tried, could actually be detrimental to the patient because of the risk of side effects from the procedure.”

But he admitted financial pressures were a factor in the decision. “I believe that these thresholds will produce some clear benefits in that both patients and their GPs will know when these procedures will be performed,” he added. The clinical director of the National Obesity Forum, GP Dr David Haslam, said that he was alarmed by the level being set at a body mass index (BMI) of 30.

“This level condemns a quarter of the population to misery - there’s a huge number of people with a BMI of over 30. “The argument that the life of joints is reduced because people are overweight is more relevant to those with a BMI of above 40.

- Read more about socialized medicine here ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/24/2005 at 05:07 AM   
Filed Under: • Health-Medicine • Hildabeast •  
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