"Leg Lost, Dancer Is Caught Between Caregivers"

Upon browsing through the New York Times a very interesting article caught my eye. The article was entitled “Leg Lost, Dancer Is Caught Between Caregivers” by Deborah Sontag. This article talks about the struggles of Fabienne Jean, a dancer whose leg was amputated in the Haiti earthquake this past January. The amputation is a tragedy in and of itself, but the real bizarre twist on this article is that there are two healthcare providers in the United States fighting over who is going to rehabilitate her. One would think that Fabienne Jean would be provided the care that she chooses, and that the rehabilitation would begin as soon as possible. Healthcare is typically not associated with these types of battles. Ms. Jean’s story has been sort of labeled as the poster child of Haiti’s resilience. A lot of news sources are trying to exploit her story in order to show this resilience. It does seem like these healthcare providers are trying to be the one to take care of her so they get some of that media attention by association. Another point that the article brought up was that Fabienne Jean’s story also highlights how dependent the Haitian people are on international charity. Overall this article was very good, but on the other hand I immediately thought of how idiotic it is for healthcare providers to essentially fight over caring for a patient.

photo credit to Damon Winter

Response to Ambition posted by Chelsi

Reading Chelsi’s blog post about ambitions for the future provided me the opportunity to reflect upon my own dreams and ambitions. Chelsi seems to have based her hopes for the future on her service for others; this is quite admirable. When she looks into the future, she sees herself supporting a cause that would benefit a multitude of people, not just herself.

When I initially thought of the future and what I wanted to accomplish I felt a tad more self-centered. Immediately I know that I want to achieve good grades in school and graduate. I know that I eventually want to get a respectable job, make money and simply enjoy life. Upon thinking about it more and delving a little deeper, I realized there is something that I would love to do.

I had the opportunity to travel to Denmark while I was in high school and was able to experience the joys of traveling and of learning of another culture. I was enamored by the Danish way of life and would truly enjoy to go back again to learn even more. I was incredibly interested by the striking differences between the general way of life in the United States and Denmark. I was inspired by this experience to write my research paper on the topic of infrastructure and its effect on the health and wellness of its inhabitants. In general, the Danish tend to be healthier due to a variety of transportation means, including biking. I would love to go back there and spend more time further immersing myself in their culture and really documenting the differences between the United States and Denmark. As I hope to work in the realm of radiology, I do concern myself with health. Observing ways in which people can incorporate exercise into their daily lives, such as choosing a healthier means of transportation, is incredibly interesting to me. I hope to have the opportunity to observe this trend in the Danish society again. It seems that I have the same ambitions as many of my peers. I want a stable and healthy life and would like to be successful; however, one ambition very specific to me is the drive to re-visit a land that has captivated me.

"Letting Women Reach Women in Afghan War"

I read an article by Elisabeth Bumiller entitled “Letting Women Reach Women in Afghan War”, that discusses the United States newest team going out to aid in the effort in Afghanistan. What is special about this new team is that these are “female engagement teams”, solely comprised of female marines. These marines had to take “cultural awareness” class in order to learn how to communicate with the villagers in Afghanistan. They were also told that they have to pull their pony tails through their helmets in order to make it visibly clear that they are female marines. The marines know that Afghan women are culturally off limit to outside males. The female marines will accompany the males on their patrols meeting with Afghan women to assess their need for aid and gather intelligence. General Stanley A. McChrystal started this campaign in order to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people. They want to gain the trust of the people, and they have only been talking to the men. They needed this team in order to also communicate with the other half of the Afghan population. “A team is to arrive in a village, get permission from the male elder to speak with the women, settle into a compound, hand out school supplies and medicine, drink tea, make conversation and, ideally, get information about the village, local grievances and the Taliban.”

The article makes the point that this new team shows how much things have changed in the 9 years that the United States has been in Afghanistan. The military has changed its fighting tactics as well as the gender roles within the ranks. Although women are still not allowed to be in certain positions, they are being used for more important roles and accompany men on dangerous missions. Women in these teams said they weren’t looking for combat positions; they just wanted to get off of base and be used for more than just searching women at checkpoints or being cooks or engineers. Part of their cultural awareness when engaging with the Afghan women includes them wearing scarves on their heads as a sign of respect if they decide they feel safe enough to take their helmets off. The troops hope that by gaining the trust of the Afghan women that overall the men and women of Afghanistan will be less suspicious of the American troops. The marines are apprehensive to start these new missions, but hope with all the right training that they will be prepared for whatever comes their way.

After reading this article I am curious about how these new teams will work out and if there is a visible difference from before there were these female outreach teams compared to after. I really hope that with these teams and through other efforts that the American troops will be able to gain the trust of the Afghan citizens. I have never really been interested in the effort overseas, because it didn’t seem like we were getting anywhere in the War on Terror. I normally would pass over any type of article on the war, but for once this article grabbed my attention and held it while I was reading. I also think it is really awesome that women in the armed forces, in this case the Marines, are getting increasingly important positions. After reading this article, whatever rules there are in place against women in front line combat does not seem like that big of a deal. These women said that that wasn’t there main desire being a part of the military. They want to do important work and be knowledgeable enough to handle weapons and defend themselves in crisis situations, but they do not necessarily want to be on the front line. I do think that it would be nice to change those rules though to create general equality as well as to open up the opportunity to women who meet front line combat standards. This article was very interesting on all aspects.

In Response to Casey's Blog: Reality TV: The New American Law and Life Machine

I completely agree with everything that is stated in Casey’s blog, and hold my own opinions even beyond hers. To say that reality television in America has taken hold of what people do in their daily lives is an understatement. One of the examples used was for the Jersey Shore. The Jersey Shore’s premiere season was only on the air for a couple short months, but it took the country by storm. Most people made fun of the show and mimicked the cast members, but nonetheless the reality TV show became a topic of everyday discussion. From personal experience I can say that my sisters and I would bring up the reality show as dinner conversation and even taught my father how to ‘fist pump like a champ’. Even as my family spoke of the show while out to eat at the Olive Garden restaurant, the waitress smiled as we brought up certain issues and laughed about different episodes. I’m pretty sure that every child, teenager, and adult has been educated on at least some aspect of the Jersey Shore mentality. In its short running the Jersey Shore reality show made quite an impact on popular culture. One could not even escape them on what seemed to be more respectable programming like the Jay Leno Show or Ellen DeGeneres.

As Casey discussed, there are a lot of controversial issues being brought up on reality television that are making the American public more familiar with those issues and almost to the point where they feel knowledgeable on the subject. Casey discussed the idea of the TV show Teen Mom and how it is almost glamorizing teen pregnancy. Some of the teenage girls clearly show the struggles a teen mom can go through, but those moms are being rewarded with publicity through a television show and often times there is some sort of resolution to their problem by the end of the episode. A lot of the struggle is cut out to fit it into a one episode viewing. Teen Mom does more harm than it does good at this point. MTV has decided that parading around a bunch of teenage girls and cute little babies would be something that would draw viewers in. For that purpose the executives were right. Many people tune in each week to watch the relationship problems between the couples as well as catch a glimpse of the adorable little babies. MTV has not brought real American issues to the forefront as much as it has made something like teen pregnancy seem like a good idea to an impressionable age group. I do like how Casey brought up that at least one of the teen stories has good aspects to it. The story where the teen mother put her daughter up or adoption, and got the help she needed to try and deal with such a difficult decision. That situation showed the maturity one teenager had in order to make a decision that would ultimately give the child a better life.

Many reality shows have come along in recent years that border on the line of ridiculous, but other shows do show some promise and have some purpose to them. I actually do appreciate shows like Celebrity Rehab, the Biggest Loser, and Hoarders on TLC. The reason I appreciate the concept behind this type of reality show is that it brings some of America’s biggest issues up and helps to give some understanding to what may have seemed ridiculous before. Celebrity Rehab has a good foundation for a show I think because it clearly displays how unglamorous drug and alcohol abuse is as well as the fact that celebrities do not always have it all. Most importantly though, the show demonstrates that getting help is the right thing to do. Getting help may be hard at first, but truly is rewarding in the end. I also appreciate the Biggest Loser because obesity is one of the biggest health issues in America today. By having a show that hits so close to home with many Americans, I think a lot of lives have been affected by it. I’m sure that many weight loss stories can be attributed to the inspiration behind the Biggest Loser. Lastly, I feel that Hoarders is an acceptable reality TV show because it gives a lot of information on a relatively unknown disorder. I’m sure a lot of people look at hoarders as freaks for insane things they save in their lives. This show hopefully allows hoarders in general to become more understood in society and helps to aid in the treatment of their disease.

I hope in the future that more reality shows that bring real issues to the forefront are created instead of some of the trash that is being forced on the youth of American today.

Denmark and the U.S. Health Care System

Traveling has always been one of my many passions. I have been fortunate enough to travel all around the world including places like Mexico, Belize, Puerto Rico, Grand Cayman, the Bahamas, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, Aruba, Spain, France, and Denmark. Of all the places that I have been Denmark has been the most recent and one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.
I was privileged enough to be able to travel with my school as an exchange student for ten days where I stayed with a host family in the town of Haslev, Denmark. My family has had exchange students from Spain and England in the past, but being on the other side of the situation was a true eye opener. There were four people in my host family, one girl who was my age, her younger sister, and her parents. I was extremely nervous to meet them all to begin with, and then I quickly realized that both the mother and younger sister did not speak English, and the father’s English was broken. It became obvious to me that communicating in my usual manner would not always be appropriate and I could have been put into a few awkward situations. In my experience I also learned of how kind and generous the people of Denmark are. My host family tried so hard to accommodate me, even though they did not speak my language. They went out of their way to make me feel at home and like I was a part of their family. I learned from other students that this was not just happening at my home, which made us all realize that the Danes truly are outstanding and incredible people. I got to see the beautiful sights of one of the happiest countries on Earth. Denmark will always hold a special place in my heart and because I am still in contact with my host I hope to be able to visit again.
All this talk about Denmark reminded me of the issues that are going on in the United States health care system right now. Experts have really been asking a lot of questions lately about what the Danes do right with their health care system that we (The United States) aren’t doing. An article from triplepundit.com entitled, “What the U.S. Can Learn From Denmark About Health Care”, discusses the fact that President Obama is just now talking about how the United States began to computerize health care records last year when Denmark has been doing this for over a decade now. This simple act can save billions of dollars, jobs, and cut down on medical errors. President Obama has pledged $19.5 billion dollars to have medical records computerized by the year 2014. Since Denmark has been mostly using a computerized health care system for over a decade a Commonwealth Fund study published last month said the Danish information system is the world’s most efficient. This is said to save Denmark over $120 million dollars a year. With America being one of the world’s highest spenders in health care, saving $120 million dollars a year would go a long way. The article also states that U.S. family physicians have the highest administration cost in the developed world, and paperwork really puts a lot of stress on them. If the paperwork was eliminated due to all of the medical information being put into a database, then doctors’ offices would run much more smoothly. Having all of a patient’s health history in a database would improve instant access to that critical health information and improve the quality of service a patient would get.
With all of the turmoil in the U.S. health care system right now, little actions like digitalizing our health records would be a step in the right direction toward a better working setup in our country. For what may seem like obvious reasons, this won’t solve all of our health care system issues, but it will certainly improve them. So maybe the United States should take a few notes from the country I have grown so fond of.