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| Waiting for the doctor this morning - never a happy camper |
This morning I had my six month checkup visit to my doctor at the VA. I am so glad I am in the VA system. I truly believe being in the VA system and having regular six month checkups have saved my life.
My appointment today was for 11:30 am. I drove down to Georgetown, where the local VA outpatient clinic is located. Dennis, an assistant was waiting outside. After I parked my car and got out and approached the facility, he hollered to me "Are you Mr. Tipton?" I said "Yes." He motioned with his arm for me to follow him inside.
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| VA Outpatient Clinic Georgetown, Delaware |
What service! So much for the naysayers for government healthcare. I followed him in. He measured my height. 74 inches. I shrunk. I used to be 75 inches. He told me not to worry about it. Happens to everyone when they get older. There we go with the "older" thing again. Oh well.
Then he motioned for me to have a seat. I took my jacket off (nice day today but still a bit of a chill out on this sunny day) and he took my blood pressure. 135 over 72. I said "That's a little big high isn't it?" He said "No, that's normal." Then he stuck a thermometer in my mouth and took my temperature. I don't know what my temperature was but it probably was alright because after he took the thermometer out he motioned for me to have a seat to wait for my doctor.
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| Waiting Room Georgetown VA Outpatient Clinic |
I took my seat, got out my iPhone and within five minutes, my doctor open the door to his office and came out to get me. As I greeted him he said "That's what I like to see, a big smile. You know Mr. Tipton we get so many people here who don't smile, it's nice to see a smile like yours." Hey, I didn't know I smiled that much but it's nice to hear.
I followed I'm into his small office and had a seat. I won't go into the details of what we talked about except to mentioned that I did tell him about the painful skin condition on my back that was causing me a great deal of pain. He took a look and said it was a very common condition called seborrheic keratosis, a non cancerous skin condition. A couple of days ago it was itching so much and I scratched too hard thus breaking the skin and causing some major pain. He prescribed a cortisone cream. I have it on now and the pain is almost gone. Thank you doctor!
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| Not me but doctor similar to mine this morning under same circumstances - I get the best care at the VA! |
I was in his office for almost an hour. Oh yes, government health care, the big bogeyman that the Republican are trying to scare everyone about. Well, we covered everything from the side effects of my prostate cancer treatment to comparing U.S. healthcare with government run Canadian healthcare. With both programs, one has to wait for major procedures so there isn't any difference. I told him that with him I can spend time with my doctor that my private doctors (and I have a slew of them) don't seem to have the time for me because they're off to see another patient. To me that is one of the major differences between government run health care and private health care. Of course I use private health care now because of the geographical convenience. I can't be running to Wilmington (89 miles away) every time I need to see my urologist, oncologist, cardiologist, dermatologist, eye doctor and dentist. Besides if I did the VA in Wilmington still charges my Medicare just like the private doctors do now.
So all in all I had a good visit. As I left to go out into this wonderful sunny spring day, I made another appointment for six months hence in October.
All is well in the World of Ron. Back to our regular programming now.
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| My happy tulips waiting for me when I got home |