Mark Feeling Bad After Chemo. A Major Difference in Thai Hospitals Compared to Those in USA
Mr. Mark is e-mailing every day : a major feat for a guy with cancer who felt so bad much of 2005 that he e-mailed only a few times when he felt an urgent need to check on close friends or to try to deal with finances. Mark is sick after chemotherapy early this week. He may be over the major vomiting and is eating only "small bits of food" as his digestive tract hurts.
Mark had a chest x-ray this week because he had a strange bump on his chest after coughing bouts and is having pain in that area. His x-ray showed 7 old rib fractures which he attributes to a skiing accident from hitting a moguol at a high speed and doing some involuntary acrobatics. "It hurt a lot at the time, but I just kept going", he says. I recall skiing with Mark one time when although he had brought his own skis, he rented high performance skis. We even bought some tire chains for our car because the road was closed to the slopes to anyone without tire chains. We were determined to get some skiing in.
I wonder if Mark might have broken one or more of these ribs when he was into sky diving and broke his leg. Speaking of injuries, Mr. Ron Cruzan one of Mark's friends from Junior High and High School called tonight. My uncle Bob had tracked Ron down to tell him about Mark. Ron relates that he was recently in a serious multi rotational roll over accident as a passenger, and had to be cut from the car and taken by helicoptor to the hospital. He is back to work, but it looked like he was trying to beat Mr. Mark to the pearly gates.
Mark is concerned about the cost of treatment After one year of chemotherapy and radiation, Mark and I have passed the $100,000 mark in spending for his treatment out of our pockets. He has run through his life insurance and I am into my retirement fund. Early in his bout with cancer, some people from his work on Saipan donated money and sick time. After that we received a check from Dr. Brown and his wife Kris and some money from a special fund at our church and from our sunday school class and some family and friends for a total of 2,400 dollars. This really helped. Some people sent money in cards and letters. A stranger from Hollywood sent talking books and a cassette player. Mark wants everyone to be thanked. He does not want to miss anyone. Every gift, big or small is very important to keep him in treatment and to keep him believing that people care.
One big difference between hospitals in Thailand and the USA is that you do not run up a bill and not pay in Thailand. Mark pays everytime he gets treatment. If he does not pay then no more treatment. A friend in the USA who has cancer lost a spouse about 5 years ago to cancer. The spouse died in the hospital and my friend has not paid the spouse's hospital bill yet. There are some extenuating circumstances in this case, but circumstances or not, this does not happen in Thailand. Friend Ian could not get the hospital to release Pui's body until he went back to his hotel and got information to use on the web to download proof he had wired money from his bank to the hospital to cover the entire bill and the finance supervisor reluctantly gave approval to release the body. Pui died in the afternoon and it was very late at night before the finances could be taken care of and the body released so her family could make a long trip home from Bangkok to their village.
Advice today: You may sit on someones tombstone after they die and talk to them and they may hear you and appreciate it, but why take a chance? Call everyone important to you or go see them or write a note today. Take a look at what is really important in life. No one knows if they will be here tomorrow. Do more hugging and enjoying and less complaining.