This morning I watched a show about Israel’s healthcare system having found (after much experimentation) an effective treatment for TBI (traumatic brain injury)and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). The show demonstrated how a legislator was trying to get the VA to experiment with the treatment. He indicated that 22 Veterans commit suicide daily and that many are desperate for finding ways to help Veterans with trauma.

American healthcare is turning down new and better treatments for all of us. Part of the problem is our capitalistic structure which always asks the question, how much profit is available? If there is no profit to be made, the American Healthcare system says no. After all, profit is the construct by which healthcare exists in America.

I think that there is another problem with healthcare in America. It’s my personal observation as well as the reporting of an entire chronically ill community~

American Healthcare believes that they have arrived. They know everything and what they don’t know isn’t important. For the chronically ill that’s the source of all of the gaslighting they receive in the treatment rooms of America. “You mean my treatment has not resolved your chronic pain? Well that can’t be, perhaps you aren’t exercising as prescribed.” Patient blaming runs rampant with this group of doctors. As an aside, I always wonder why doctors choose their professions if they can’t be fascinated with all kinds of illness and all kinds of possibilities for effective treatment?

Possibility Rejection ~

If you are a psychiatrist you most certainly will have patients with PTSD. If your only treatment for these disorders is Xanax and Ambien then you are far behind the research of today and you could be doing a much better job of treating your patients.

This is true of almost any disorder. Look at how much has been done in the treatment of addiction in the last 30 years, it’s been astronomical. The discoveries have been wildly variable. The discoveries also upend previous beliefs about addiction. When society thought it was behavior, and it really was about brain chemicals and even DNA.

Reality of Now

You’ll find that not many American doctors are willing to treat patients using new research. If they are American, they must bow down to the insurance companies and if they are human, they are sure that they already know it all and can’t possibly learn new things.

For the people in my community, people with complex disorders that involve muscles, bones, nerves, the brain and emotions as well, doctors are distinctly uncertain about how to proceed. Thus, the game of victim blaming, and gaslighting begins.

Only in America, huh.