It has been over six months now since my sister, Dara, had her aneurysm, and I call her each day to say hello. I realize she is suffering and that suffering isolates a person from friends and family. She is in a Torrance, California nursing home, which is near to her adopted home in Lomita. She moved to California five or six years ago
I visited Dara in early November because I was concerned about the level of care she was getting. I realized that nursing homes range in the amount of services they can provide, and though there are good people working at these institutions, levels of care often vary by individuals. My advocacy has helped her a bit, though the nursing home gets upset with me from time to time. I realize that many of the staff do their best and are overstaffed, but still, a sick person is bed-bound for over six months and is not receiving adequate care. It is a balancing act.
I am saddened with the overall care my sister receives. To give a snapshot, she was hospitalized at UCLA Harbor Medical Center, Torrance Memorial Hospital, Rancho Los Amigos, Providence Little Company of Mary from June 15 to September 10th before she was moved to her current long-term care nursing home in Torrance. The goal of her present place is to custodial care, which is to provide her with basic nursing home care: feeding, cleaning, and general comfort.
During these past six months, she has received no physical, occupational, or speech therapy, and she is not significantly improving.
Her neurosurgeon expected her to recover from the aneurysm within two weeks and there was great optimism after the surgery. She suffered from severe headaches, blurred vision, lack of motor skills, and the inability to walk. She suffers from those same symptoms today. She had been mostly bed-bound for six months and has not had any physical therapy to help her heal. The body tries to correct itself when it is active, and if it is immobile for any sort of time, it takes extra effort to get it jump started to rebuild muscle and functionality. A body in motion tends to stay in motion; a body that is inert, requires great initiative to get it moving again.
During these intervening months, I received good stories of people's progress. A boy, who also suffered from similar tragedy, received physical therapy from the start. He is recovering almost miraculously. A man in his 80's was moved to a skilled nursing home and, because the doctors thought he suffered from a stroke, received speech therapy, and he says that the therapy reversed a throat condition he had prior to the stroke. These are wonderful stories.
With those great stories, I hold it in tension with my sister's condition. Those two examples are from people who received immediate and sustained care, and that care worked. My sister, in contrast, has not received care, mostly because the insurance companies are waiting for doctor's orders. The longer my sister waits, the less she will be able to recover. The insurance companies, especially for the poor, do not want to pay for care or services, and they wear people down so that they give up.
The difference: my sister is poor. The insurance companies know that. The nursing home said it in so many words to me. My sister is not any different between the other patients in that center. It is simply two different systems: private health care will get you well; for those who cannot afford health care, they will not get well.
It makes it difficult to pray because I'm grateful for the good news the other patients received and I'm distraught and mostly powerless with regards to my sister's state.
Day after day, I call my sister. I advocate for her as best I can. I encourage her and express hope, which I still have. I pray each day. During Advent, I prayed that the lame would walk, the deaf would hear, the blind would see, and I asked specifically for my sister's healing. I asked for some noticeably sign that she was getting better. Now that we are in the Christmas season, I ask the Lord to touch her life, to heal her, and to give her hope.
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