The struggle to your eyesight
Most individuals take their imaginative and prescient with no consideration — till they encounter an emergency and each minute earlier than surgical procedure issues.
Fast entry to an working room can imply the distinction between blindness and sight. Hospital consolidation has left Boston with fewer working room areas to serve sufferers, together with these with eye emergencies. Persons are as a substitute being handled at ambulatory surgical procedure facilities (ASC) which have restricted hours and little flexibility to accommodate emergencies.
Medicare reimburses ASCs on the similar price, whether or not surgical procedure is an emergency or not. In consequence, they normally prioritize non-urgent procedures like colonoscopies which are scheduled far prematurely and happen throughout common hours. That makes it more and more troublesome for retina specialists to safe area in an emergency. So troublesome, actually, that my very own colleagues incessantly ask me to seek out them working room area at a hospital the place I stored privileges and generally is a lifeline.
Working room area shouldn’t be a problem when somebody’s eyesight is on the road. Senators Markey and Warren, and all the Massachusetts congressional delegation, want to inform Medicare officers to pay ASCs premium charges for emergency procedures.
Andre J. Witkin, MD
Boston
Diana DiZoglio
I simply learn in your letter to the editor by Paul Baranofsky Feb. 1, on Diana DiZoglio for governor of Massachusetts. What an excellent learn! What a beautiful concept. She might be trusted by the individuals of Massachusetts to work for them and take care of our state.
Ray O’Brien
Medford
Homeless deaths
It was solely a matter of time earlier than homeless people would die on the streets of the “metropolis that by no means sleeps” (“Mamdani’s homeless coverage turns lethal,” Boston Herald, Feb. 2). Mayor Mamdani has said the homeless won’t be compelled off the streets. I assume he meant what he mentioned. Following the Arctic chilly and a serious snow storm, 14 New York residents already reportedly froze to loss of life. Most of them apparently homeless.
I so agree with a lot of the mayor’s critics, similar to former NY lieutenant governor Betsy McCaughey. Mamdani didn’t do near sufficient getting the homeless out of frigid outside situations and into shelters. As somebody who labored 40 years as each a psychological well being counselor and a police officer for the Metro Boston Space Division of Psychological Well being, I typically knew purchasers who died outdoors within the chilly regardless of quite a few makes an attempt by workers, however when the “deinstitutionalization” insurance policies took maintain within the mid-Seventies, it solely elevated the variety of people who selected the chance of loss of life on the streets over a heat mattress.
Sal Giarratani
East Boston
