by Dave Knechel

Created on: April 28, 2008

Hope for the Uninsured

Around the end of October of 2006, I bought 2 bags of candy to hand out to trick or treaters. I live on a street where no children reside and we seldom get Halloween visitors. Few came and someone had to eat all that leftover chocolate. It was gone in days. Little did I know that, two weeks later, I would test my blood glucose on a dare and within a month, be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. I have no idea how high my sugar went from eating that candy, how long I've had the disease or how much damage I've done, but many people could have diabetes or other conditions for many years and not know it. I had symptoms for quite some time and shrugged them off, like a lot of men do. I hate going to the doctor. Constant hunger with a sudden loss of weight, frequent urination and the tingling, numbness and sharp pains in my extremities from diabetic neuropathy were warnings I should not have ignored, but maladies that creep up with middle age and the lack of health insurance were good enough excuses for me to pretend nothing was seriously wrong. Until that day a lancet pierced my finger, those symptoms meant nothing. How quickly life changes. I needed help and I got it, but my thoughts turned to the countless others without health insurance. What about low-income families who don't go to the doctor because they can't afford to? Are they aware there's help out there? There is, but the trick is how to educate them about where to go for treatment.

In the Orlando, Florida area, there are clinics affiliated with PCAN, the Primary Care Access Network (http://www.orangecountyfl.net/cms/DEPT/hfs/healthse rvices/pcan/default.htm) that specializes in health care for the under-insured. There's the Central Florida Family Health Center (http://cffhc.org/) with locations scattered throughout the area. You pay according to your income level based on the US Department of Health & Human Services' poverty guidelines. For the homeless, there's HCCH (http://www.hcch.org/home1.htm), the Health Care Center for the Homeless. Also, try the Florida Association of Community Health Centers (http://www.fachc.org/index.php).

Thankfully, our community is also blessed with faith-based Shepherd's Hope, nonprofit clinics that provide free assistance in a family-practice setting. Their mission is not one of continuous-care. It is to provide non-emergency treatment to those in need. Presently, there are 8 all volunteer health centers and they are a godsend. Their website (http://shepherdshope.org)

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