Share Your Voice: Where Ideas Come Alive
Join our vibrant community forum where your perspectives matter. Whether you're passionate about today's pressing issues, have a humorous take on life, or want to showcase your literary talents—this is your platform to shine. Submit your written pieces, captivating visuals, or powerful videos and become part of a conversation that inspires, challenges, and connects us all.
My mother is a cancer warrior who has been fighting for her life since last year. But with little support, it is becoming an arduous and lonely battle. The much-touted Golden Card scheme's promise of covering up to ₹5 lakhs per annum seems more like a distant dream.
I was shocked when I applied for the Golden Card to find that the scheme would cover only a small percentage of the chemotherapy costs while leaving us to bear a huge and unaffordable cost per session.
My mother's treatment consists of periodic chemotherapy, which costs over ₹40,000 per session. She has to undergo the sessions every 28 days, and the yearly cost comes out to be close to ₹4.5 lakhs. According to government assurances, we were supposed to get ₹5 lakhs under the Golden Card Scheme.
When we were preparing my mother for the chemotherapy session, the hospital personnel told us that the Golden Card Scheme would apparently cover just ₹14,000 per session of the treatment expenditure. Much of the amount allotted was exhausted in the purchase of required drugs.
To add insult to injury, there were restrictions as to where we could obtain the drugs. They could be bought only in certain pharmacies that typically had restricted supplies, were distant from the hospital, and were more expensive.
To our chagrin, the pharmacy of the hospital sold us an injection for ₹25,000, which we later learned could have been purchased for ₹17,000 at any outside pharmacy. This overt discrepancy in price is nothing but a clear indication of the failure of our healthcare system. This compounded our cost burden and was most inconvenient.
My mother also suffered from anxiety as we grappled to get a CT scan. In spite of the doctor's insistence to get the scan as early as possible, the hospital informed us that we would have to wait for over 40 days for a follow-up appointment. The urgency of her condition left us with no choice but to get the scan privately at a great cost.
I observed that other patients were going through the same dilemma as us. One young girl, who was sobbing in pain, had waited for weeks to undergo a vital surgery, but the hospital cancellations and postponements had rendered her family helpless and frustrated.
An old man, who was lying on his bed immobile, was compelled to seek treatment at a private hospital because of the excessive waiting time at the government hospital, and as a result, his family had accumulated huge debts.
While sitting next to my mother, attempting to provide what little reassurance I could, I couldn't help but be outraged and upset by the system that was letting us all down. The sights, sounds, and odors of the ward all weighed heavily around us – a burden we carry in and outside the hospital as our loved ones battle a deadly disease.
My mother is a cancer warrior who has been fighting for her life since last year. But with little support, it is becoming an arduous and lonely battle. The much-touted Golden Card scheme's promise of covering up to ₹5 lakhs per annum seems more like a distant dream.
I was shocked when I applied for the Golden Card to find that the scheme would cover only a small percentage of the chemotherapy costs while leaving us to bear a huge and unaffordable cost per session.
My mother's treatment consists of periodic chemotherapy, which costs over ₹40,000 per session. She has to undergo the sessions every 28 days, and the yearly cost comes out to be close to ₹4.5 lakhs. According to government assurances, we were supposed to get ₹5 lakhs under the Golden Card Scheme.
When we were preparing my mother for the chemotherapy session, the hospital personnel told us that the Golden Card Scheme would apparently cover just ₹14,000 per session of the treatment expenditure. Much of the amount allotted was exhausted in the purchase of required drugs.
To add insult to injury, there were restrictions as to where we could obtain the drugs. They could be bought only in certain pharmacies that typically had restricted supplies, were distant from the hospital, and were more expensive.
To our chagrin, the pharmacy of the hospital sold us an injection for ₹25,000, which we later learned could have been purchased for ₹17,000 at any outside pharmacy. This overt discrepancy in price is nothing but a clear indication of the failure of our healthcare system. This compounded our cost burden and was most inconvenient.
My mother also suffered from anxiety as we grappled to get a CT scan. In spite of the doctor's insistence to get the scan as early as possible, the hospital informed us that we would have to wait for over 40 days for a follow-up appointment. The urgency of her condition left us with no choice but to get the scan privately at a great cost.
I observed that other patients were going through the same dilemma as us. One young girl, who was sobbing in pain, had waited for weeks to undergo a vital surgery, but the hospital cancellations and postponements had rendered her family helpless and frustrated.
An old man, who was lying on his bed immobile, was compelled to seek treatment at a private hospital because of the excessive waiting time at the government hospital, and as a result, his family had accumulated huge debts.
While sitting next to my mother, attempting to provide what little reassurance I could, I couldn't help but be outraged and upset by the system that was letting us all down. The sights, sounds, and odors of the ward all weighed heavily around us – a burden we carry in and outside the hospital as our loved ones battle a deadly disease.
Have you liked the news article?