The Patient’s Role in Pres. Obama’s Health Plan

After I studied what the Obama health plan entails, I want to identify an additional important perspective. As president of Life Skills Institute, I have been working with the chronically ill and disabled for over 25 years. The focus of my work is to help people in a health crisis connect to powerful inner resources and play an active role in healing.

In the American journal of Medicine, it said the attitude a patient walks into When patients become partners with their doctor, this creates the most effective health plan because, when inner resources and outer resources work together, treatments become more effective. the doctor’s office with has a significant effect on the effectiveness of the treatment. Doctors are responsible for the medical treatments and the patient has to be responsible for the attitude. Too often, patients approach their doctor in the consciousness of a victim. They are not participating in healing and feel that the doctor is responsible for their health. This puts their focus on their thoughts instead of focusing on and activating inner resources that would make them partners with their doctor. To be effective, any health plan has to look at the patient’s role in healing.

When I hear about Pres. Obama’s health plan, I see government’s responsibility, insurance companies’ responsibility and doctors’ responsibility. What I do not see is the responsibility of the patient. The empowered patient becomes a partner with medical professionals. I feel that empowering patients to take an active role in healing will lower medical expenses, reduce suffering and make treatments more effective. This can be as simple as developing life skills that tap inner resources and create an inner healing environment. I call this using The Wisdom of the Body. This powerful inner resource is only limited by the patient’s anxious thinking, stress and fear. However, if the patients could connect to these inner resources, Pres. Obama’s health plan should be even more effective.

Having Multiple Sclerosis for 28 years, I personally know the benefits of active patient participation. I feel any health plan needs to consciously incorporate the patient’s role in healing.