Reading Journal #4

If Air Travel Worked Like Health Care

What a nightmare!  The article relates what a conversation would be like if air travel worked like health care and one were trying to fly from point A to point B.  It highlights how none of the multiple systems and databases in health care operate on the same wavelength.  No one across health care platforms communicates, nearly identical forms must be filled out with a multitude of providers.  Health insurance is selective as to who and what it covers.  Multiple phone calls must be made to accomplish anything.

"This system is insane. It is fragmented to the point of incoherence. Record-keeping is stuck in the 1960s. Communication is stuck in the 1980s. None of the systems talks to the others. Everyone reinvents the wheel at every stage of the process. There is no pricing transparency."

How true.  Just the other day I was on the phone with my health insurance company who is billing me for an outrageous amount.  Didn't I already pay the co-pay?  Isn't that what the co-pay is for?  Why are there so many hidden fees, fine lines, and clauses?  Why can't health care work like air travel?!

Reading Journal #2/3

The Other Labor Day

No word of a lie, after reading the first paragraph I could not read other sentence until I had ice cream in front of me.  So I trekked across the street in the freezing temperatures to obtain some ice cream from my neighboring Tedeschi store.  As I stood there debating between Ben & Jerry's Phish Food and S'mores I told myself that I will not be part of that 62% that have an increased risk of ovulation-related fertility problems because I didn't treat myself to two servings of ice cream a week.  I no longer have to consider ice cream a treat, but now a prophylactic treatment.

Now that I am situated inside my house eating my s'mores ice cream right out of the carton I can continue my reading.

The article Baby Lust describes the lengths some women, including the author will go to to conceive.  But some of the facts she stated, including the one regarding ice cream consumption are shocking.  I almost want to throw out all the yogurt in my fridge knowing that it may some day make it twice as hard for me to have a baby.

In the article Artificial Wombs, the scientist Liu is working with her team to create a viable artificial womb  that can aid women who cannot carry their own fetus.  She has started with artificial rodent wombs, though she has had limited success thus far.  None of her rodents have survived life outside the womb for more than a few days.  She has hope that she will have a successful rodent womb within the next few years, and a human womb closely after that.  In this day in age, I cannot say this technology is very surprising, and once accomplished it will hopefully will be a great tool for those couples who cannot have have a child traditionally, but still want one of their own flesh and blood.  However it could be a dangerous tool in the hands of those who are capable but do not wish to carry their own baby.

Reading Journal #1

House of Memories

A very emotional tour of this woman's house, this article almost brought me to tears.  I cannot imagine what she must be going through just walking around her house.  She questions whether a house is just a structure that houses us, or one that also houses our memories.  She tells us about her struggle with the sickness and eventual death of her husband just as they are starting their new life together.  She questions the effect moving out of the house would have on her memories of her time there.  As she guides the reader around the house she shows memories of events that have happened in specific locations.  She questions the effect moving out of the house would have on the memories made there.

I love how she uses vivid details to make the reader feel like they are reliving the memory too.  I can picture the rooms and the memories, the pain of dealing with the loss of her young husband.