The never-ending milk of Medicare and its feeding of the in-laws' delusions

My step father, one year 2.2million Medicare $$'s, the next 1.6million, last 10 months 1.4 million, to keep someone alive on life support, although he had a DNR, whatever the doctor said was what he did, I am surprised they didn't cut off his ding dong.
Yes, the doctors are getting very rich otherwise they would not do what they are doing.

So got back from having to ferry fil. It’s another device to try to control fils a fib as his body rejected the first one. Boy did the second one illuminate its manufacturers stock on release. It won’t affect his mobility, though the general anesthesia might.

Same with mil. Should either two of the most deadly cancers recur, it’ll be all hands on deck, more acuity, it’s my civil right to demand a million dollar treatment and you’re killing grandma if you don’t.

These pre boomers amuse me as it’s actually the boomers, their children, already drawing more rage. Even as a bloc, they’re now outnumbered by two to three generations.

I’m mostly ranting, but hope I come off a little rational.

Which is to say, mil, that you def are here because of your induction chemo, your refractory chemo and rads that took eight hospitalizations, plus the four you had from complications. Two years later, you can’t walk out your back or front door either as the disease and then it’s treatment aggravated all the other things you had, and added some. This treatment u want is high neuro risk and you have ms. So what’s the plan?

Which is to say fil, that you had this stroke event. After it got better, milk of Medicare got two head operations for you. Then a heart one. And since then you’ve sustained multiple fractures and can maybe get on the commode with help? And you want another heart operation.

The one predictable thing is decline sooner than later. If they wanna make it later in their sacred independence then how bout more safeguards to keep it I place.

Lea, I expect organ transplants have or should have criteria that favor the most healthy, or should be. There are only so many suitable donors who are mostly young. So it’d be or def should be self limiting.

Oh, I forgot, sil has some fatty liver thing. Huge back pain. Really just hire another 70k person.

Anyway, latest cancer drug, oh not so much. Some operation, not so much. They wanna age in place, then put in place a virtual nursing home instead of pretending like you’ll get back function.

No doctor is getting rich on what Medicare pays, and in fact they have to take on a few non-Medicare patients just to supplement the expenses they Medicare patient incurs. It's just that some of them can't bring themselves to be honest with their patients and tell them they can no longer do anything to improve their quality of life unless the patient himself asks. They're of the opinion that if the patient comes in seeking help, then they'll do what they can to help.

If your SO has power of attorney or is at least allowed to discuss his parents's situations with their doctors, then perhaps he should bring up that question during one of these appointments. Does the doctor believe that surgery/treatment/medication will improve his LO's condition? To what extent? What about the effects of anesthesia vs. the expected outcome from the surgery? Make him answer the tough questions, and that may well open the door for more frank discussions about how realistic these treatments really are.

SO has made his decision to use his days off as the go to for his parents. As frustrating as it is you are just going to have to accept that this is going to go on indefinitely.

And I agree with Snoopy that carrying this man down the steps in a wheel chair is a back injury waiting to happen. If it does I am sure that SO's parents will be there to help him physically and financially if that happens and he needs help. End sarcasm.

Why don’t they have a ramp out of the house? Carrying a man in a wheelchair down steps— holy moly! That just seems like an injury, accident or lawsuit waiting to happen!

"We'll manage" I've found is the headline reply.

When delving under the headline - there are holes in the story, gaping missing bits where reasoning, judgement, & decision making should be.

I remember the poster's MIL who hardly walk 10m without a fall, but would say "I'll manage" to cook for myself, wash her clothes, bathe, drive to the shops etc. Took a #hip for a hospital stay to pry her out of home. But the real change happened when the enabling daughter stoped doing all & sundry to keep up the charade.

I still think your MIL & FIL are fighting their battle with Old Age with everything they have. This may include necessary & futile treatments. It's their right to try..

Your venting (resentment? anger?) may be telling you to reduce the impact their battle has on your life. How to do this when constant drama is on the phone? Sigh.

Not for nuthin, PeggySue, but getting old is HARD. Your FIL may want to go through these surgeries in an effort to achieve a better quality of life in general. Because we all know that surgeries are not easy or a cake walk to endure! Same with cancer treatments, which should NOT be $500K in the first place. It's all a scam, no matter WHAT insurance is footing the bill, Medicare or United Healthcare or whatever private insurance is shelling out the $$$. My own husband has had over $1 million in medical bills in 2020/2021 alone, not including an upcoming liver transplant bill which will be GOD KNOWS how much from the Mayo Clinic and Kaiser. Thank God we HAVE insurance, is all I have to say, and thank God there IS treatment available. Otherwise we'd be living in a tent under a bridge somewhere in Denver to pay for it. But we've all paid into this Medicare system for our whole lives here in the US; we're entitled to use it, along with the SSI we get when we're eligible. Or we're paying into our private health insurance carriers (to the tune of $1400 a month for DH & I) so you bet your butt we're using it!

You always seem so angry & frustrated that your ILs expect to GET treatment for what ails them, yet I think we ALL do! This is our society, our world, our human expectations of our medical profession, is it not? I know it's mine; when I call 911, I expect an ambulance to come get my arse and help me get to the hospital where I then expect to get treated for whatever my issue is.

It's unfortunate your ILs depend on their children to help them. I hope they will see the light and move into AL or hire more CGs in home to give your SO a break. But in reality, even if they do move to AL, they will STILL depend on their children to help them with all sorts of things, as my parents did of me. If I wasn't there for their myriad of health issues/crises for the past 10.5 years, I have no idea what would have become of them, except to say they'd have died way sooner than they did. I suppose I could have hired a geriatric care manager though, has your SO looked into that? It's an option.

Maybe you are just venting, which you have every right to do. It just seems like your anger is getting ramped up more & more lately over your ILs situation and it won't get better; it'll only get worse, sadly. What steps are YOU taking to ensure that YOU won't be hospitalized from the stress all this is taking on you?? And/or the toll it may take on the relationship you have with your SO? I hope you have a plan to ward off all the ill effects this can have on both, for your sake. I hate to see the toll all this caregiving takes on ALL of us! It can be devastating.