boomers will cripple health-care system
Health

Four in every five Canadians believe that the demands placed on the health system by aging Baby Boomers will result in reduced access and lower quality care, a poll commissioned by the Canadian Medical Association reveals.

There are also widespread fears – by close to 75 per cent of respondents – that growing health costs will result in significant tax hikes and an inability of seniors to afford health care as they age.

At the same time, the survey shows strong support for user fees and having well-to-do Canadians pay more out-of-pocket to help attenuate the impact of caring for a growing population of seniors.

According to the poll, younger Canadians in particular (those born after 1966) are willing to adapt to the pressures on the medicare system by buying private health insurance to supplement publicly provided care, using their retirement savings to pay for health care and going into debt to pay the health costs of their parents and themselves.

“What we see in these poll results is a refreshing acknowledgment of reality,” Anne Doig, president of the CMA, said in an interview.

“Canadians are not giving up on medicare but they’re recognizing that medicare needs to be transformed to deal with current realities, demographic and otherwise,” she said.

The poll, which is being released Monday at the CMA general council meeting in Niagara Falls, Ont., dovetails nicely with a report released earlier this month entitled Health Care Transformation in Canada: Change that Works, Care that Lasts.

In that document, the CMA, the group representing Canada’s 72,000 physicians, argues that the current health system cannot meet future needs, in part because of the aging population. It calls for significant changes, including a universal prescription drug plan, a charter that enshrines the rights of patients, an independent body that can monitor whether health dollars are being spent efficiently, and monetary incentives for doctors and hospitals to treat more patients. The proposals are based on the premise that health care in Canada needs to be more patient-centred, with a greater focus on prevention and ensuring that geography, income level and age are not a barrier to getting quality, timely care.

Dr. Doig said the poll results show Canadians are pretty savvy about the challenges facing the health system.

Asked to rank who or what is most responsible for increased demand for health-care services, survey respondents blamed individual Canadians not taking responsibility for their own health (33 per cent), the large number of Baby Boomers reaching retirement age (30 per cent), higher demands and expectations by all Canadians (21 per cent) and new medical advances (16 per cent.)

Dr. Doig expressed concern that fingers would be pointed unfairly at Baby Boomers (those born between 1947 and 1966) for many of the woes of the health system.

“I worry that the blaming will happen,” she said. “We don’t want intergenerational tension, we want intergenerational fairness.”

Dr. Doig said she takes comfort in the fact that the younger Canadians who were polled “are being extremely realistic about the limits of medicare and so-called free health care.”

For example, the survey found that, among Canadians under the age of 46, 44 per cent said they were willing to buy private health insurance to supplement the publicly funded system; 37 per cent said they would also buy insurance to ensure their long-term care when they were elderly; and 29 per cent said they would save specifically to pay for health costs after retirement.

Ipsos Reid polled 3,483 Canadian adults online between June 8 and June 21. A sample of this size is considered accurate within 1.66 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

The survey, which has been conducted annually by the CMA for the past 10 years, also asks Canadians to rank the performance of governments in managing the health-care system as they would on a report card.

The marks awarded remained virtually unchanged over the past year: 41 per cent of respondents assigned either an A or B grade to the federal government performance (as 40 per cent did in 2009). Similarly, 41 per cent of Canadians awarded their provincial government either an A or B, consistent with the 2009 results (42 per cent).

Overall, 35 per cent of those polled said they thought health-care services would improve in the next year, while 51 per cent predicted they would get worse.

Health-care spending in Canada was an estimated 3-billion last year, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

Health

Over the weekend, an interesting opportunity arose.  There were a group of women together for a baby shower, and we all began discussing skin care, specifically that pertaining to anti aging.  I began to wonder what differences among these women of all ages would become apparent as we discussed what each of us looked for in an anti aging skin care review, as well as what we each thought would be important in an anti aging skin care system overall.

With the wide range of skin care products available to women and men today, an anti aging skin care review of a product can be extremely beneficial in helping to determine the best choice among many alternatives.  Anti aging skin care systems that incorporate everything you need to effectively battle wrinkles and other problem skin irritants have also become increasingly popular as people want to incorporate as much one stop shopping into their lives as possible.

The varying responses surprised me greatly.  As a person who has grown up with constant access to research vehicles and the Internet, an anti aging skin care review from an actual user of a product is most important to me.  In an anti aging skin care system, I will look for the least amount of products that will help me to keep my skin looking young, and are not time consuming or difficult to use.  It seems that others had differing thoughts though on both of these points.

Women who were in the mid stage of life, who are really beginning to notice the fine lines and wrinkles, and are kicking themselves for not thinking about this earlier, were looking for stricter guidelines in an anti aging skin care review.  These women were looking for claims of results not only from users, but are looking towards their elders in what they should be using to fend off wrinkles.

Another interesting finding was that women in this age group were looking for an anti aging skin care system that would provide them constant help.  This meant cleansers, masks, gels, creams, and the works.

Next came the older women, who you would believe would not be that concerned with anti aging creams and potions.  Important in an anti aging skin care system for these women is the overall health of their skin, and maintaining the appearance they have now, and preventing future sagging and wrinkles.  To these women an anti aging skin care review should focus on the upstanding quality of the company and how their products have helped people to reach their skin care goals.

It was interesting to me to find that even among people across 3 generations, there were such varied and strong beliefs relating to skin care.  An anti aging skin care review varied widely among these three groups of people, as well as the types of factors that each group of women thought of when purchasing skin care products.

An antiaging skin care review will help some but can be confusing.  It is best to consider an anti aging skin care system designed for the individual person.

Things to consider are: No. 1 – The ingredients. Are you allergic to any of the listed ingredients?  What is your natural skin tone?

Maybe some home TV program may have lured you in causing you to think that you were getting a high quality product.  I ordered one too, just so that I could write this anti-aging skin care review.

 I watched as the number of orders go up, I shook my head in frustration.  There is no way for any one to know what this highly advertised anti aging skin care system contains.  You cannot read the list of ingredients.  There is no way to tell if there is any clinical research to support their claims.

However, since I wanted to write this anti aging skin care review, I got out my credit card and ordered the product.  It was a “collagen kit”.  Because, I’ve done my research, I know that most any anti aging skin care system claims to include collagen.  And, since I know a little bit more about it than the average guy, I know that the fibers are usually derived form bovines, or cow hide.

Because my assignment was to provide an anti aging skin care review for this product, I ordered it anyway, at a cost of $78.  You might think of me as a guinea pig.  Better me, than you.

 I received my antiaging skin care system in the mail and I opened it with trepidation.  Finally, I could read the ingredients.  The first ingredient that I noticed was paraffin wax.  It was in the eye treatment and the lip “plumper”.

Any product that contains paraffin wax will feel like chap-stick.  If you put it around your eyes at night, you will wake up with blurred vision and sometimes itchy watering eyes.  That’s because, as you sleep, you rub your eyes, subconsciously.  So far, I have all zeros for my anti-aging skin care review and I haven’t even tried it yet.  I just know a little more than the average consumer, so I’m not looking forward to the negative results.

 I tried the eye cream in the anti aging skin care system, because I wanted to do a complete review.

 As I suspected it felt greasy, sticky and heavy.  It ended up in my eyes over night and I awoke with irritated, swollen eyes.

So, I tried the lip “plumper” in the anti aging skin care system.  I might just have well have bought a tube of Chap Stick and saved the money. But since I was writing an anti aging skin care review, I had to make the effort.  As with Chap Stick, your lips feel better initially, because the wax heals and protects them from further injury.  But, if you use something like this on a regular basis, it will eventually strip away all of the natural oils that your lips contain and they will be dryer than ever.

I have done an anti aging skin care review for a wonderful product, but it’s not available in store or on any home TV program.  If you would like to know about my review of a safe natural skin care product line just visit AHealthyRadiantSkin.com

Over the years, the culture of healthcare has changed and it has become increasingly difficult for physicians to devote extended attention and care to their patients. The daily processes of practice management can often overshadow patient care, and too much time is spent addressing frustrations such as rising costs and declining reimbursement. Many physicians are forced to question why they chose to practice medicine in the first place. Physicians challenged me to think about ways to improve physicians’ practices so more time and attention can be spent on patient care and less time focusing on costly distractions. I have developed a company that builds and supports a patient-centered practice model to allow for greater freedom and control for physicians and improved satisfaction for patients. It’s called a retainer medicine model or Concierge Medicien.  Physicians can deliver superior primary care through a modern practice model that affords them many advantages over traditional practice models.Physicians engaged in a modern practice enjoy improved patient relationships, more professional and better overall care for patients.

In order to make it through the maze of what direction to go if you are a patient and what is the right model if you are a physician, consult with the expert and see if it’s right for you. The concierge medical model has saved lives, due to early detection and physicians have a better practice model. So if you don’t have your primary doctors personal phone number and you the MD have to see 30-40 patients/day to survive—> WE NEED TO TALK! The answer is clear.

I will answer all e-mails directly before any personal information is given. abenson54@msn.com

Think about how it might help or save you

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