The language barrier for recent immigrants to the United States is taking a toll on how they receive access to and understand their health care options, according to a recent report by Kaiser. This further exemplifies the holes in the United States’ health care system, and raises huge concerns over those who are eligible and paying for health care yet are not receiving what they deserve. What is happening here and how can it be fixed?

Health care and immigration

I can only imagine how frustrating it is to be a newcomer to this country and want to get health care coverage, but not be able to find a single person to help you understand your options. For many who call the help lines for a plan like Medicaid, you may find that you can get instructions in Spanish, but what about the other hundreds of languages that immigrants speak? And what about other options for helping recent immigrants understand their health care options?

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As many Americans had hoped, President Obama is in office and the wheels appear to be in motion. The health care situation in the United States is just as grim as the rest of our economy, so it’s encouraging to see that the new administration is wasting no time rolling up their sleeves to let the health care reform work begin. However, before we get our hopes up that we are going to see some radical changes in the way health care is handled this year, some realistic expectations should be put in place. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and we shouldn’t expect new policymakers to miraculously turn around the somewhat dismal space our health care system has become. But what can we expect in 2009 from our government, and what might health care start to look like?

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Editor’s Preface: The new American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) is a revolutionary step in addressing our most vital economic challenges. A significant portion of the money doled out by the ARRA ($59 billion) will go towards immediately addressing the health crisis. This two-part series by Tara Barnes will delve into the benefits of the stimulus package’s COBRA subsidy. We have also extensively covered this subject in “COBRA Health Coverage in a Bad Economy” and “Stimulus Package and COBRA Health Coverage.”

It cannot be denied-COBRA is a huge topic in the United States right now. People are up in arms about COBRA coverage (as can be seen from response here on previous blog postings) and some significant changes and new legislation put into place by the Obama administration may change the face of COBRA.

Spending in the ARRA for Health Insurance and Care Compared with Other Sectors

The ARRA (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) was signed on February 17, 2009 and directly affects the COBRA continuation coverage rules. Because so many Americans are upset with the way COBRA coverage works, will these changes benefit or hurt those who need to rely on COBRA to keep their health insurance? Are these new changes really going to make a difference in the things that citizens are frustrating about, like the monthly cost of COBRA? Read on to find out about the new act passed and how it will affect COBRA for those people living in the real world.
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Birth control is something that all women who are sexually active and aren’t ready for children need to be thinking about. It doesn’t matter if you are already a mom of three and don’t want any more little ones running around, or if you are a young woman getting serious with your first serious boyfriend: learning about birth control options is incredibly important. All effect a woman’s body and work differently than one another, and knowing what you are putting into your body is crucial as any other information you can educate yourself with. If you are unsure about what type of birth control you want to be on and want to know the ins and outs of all your choices, please read on and educate yourself. I am no doctor, and every assertion made here should be thoroughly discussed with your doctor before starting a birth control regimen, but I at least aim to give you a starting off point to help you in making a decision.

The Pill

How exactly does the pill work? Birth control pills work mostly by preventing ovulation (the release of an egg by the ovaries). Most pills are made of two hormones called estrogen and progestin. Estrogen is a female hormone produced by the ovaries and progestin is a synthetic progesterone used as a contraceptive. For the pill to work, you have to take it every day, preferably as close to the same time every day as possible. As with any medication you take, there are risks of side effects. These could include: nausea, headaches, acne, increased blood pressure, breast tenderness, bloating, weight gain and depression. These side effects will definitely not occur in every woman, and nowadays there are varying types of birth control pills and different hormone levels, so talk to your doctor about which one might work best for you. If you are a smoker and want to take the pill, quitting is highly advised, as smoking can interfere with the pill’s effectiveness.

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These days you can’t open a newspaper, pick up a magazine or turn on the TV without being inundated with messages about being healthy. It is great that these messages are coming through the main stream media, because America is bigger and unhealthier than ever before. The good old USofA tops the charts in obesity statistics. According to the Food Standards Agency, between the years 1999-2000 34% of America’s females and 27.7% of men could have been considered obese. The next country on the list, Argentina, wasn’t too far behind, but it still doesn’t change the fact that we here in the US are letting fast food options and lazy schedules outweigh the need for making healthier choices around our eating habits. Making little changes in your diet and eating choices can really make a strong impact on your health, weight and general well-bring. If they seem all too daunting to do at once, just make a small change per week and see how your body feels. You may be pleasantly surprised at the ease of making the little things into big impacts. Read on and be healthy.

Have a Healthy Kitchen

It should come as no surprise that creating healthier eating habits begins right at home in your very own kitchen. One good place to start is a good old fashioned purge. No, not the kind that can lead to an eating disorder, but rather a purge of food in your kitchen. After coming home following an exhausting work day, it is so tempting and easy to reach for fast, yet less healthy food choices. If you make the effort to not keep any tempting food in your kitchen, you are less likely to eat it. Simple? Yes. On the same tack, take time when you have time, maybe on a Saturday or Sunday, to cook for yourself meals to last through the week. That way even if you are dragging your tired self home at 9 pm, you will already have your meal choices made for you.

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So many people (it isn’t just women) will go to any lengths to be thin. People want a quick fix, something easy, and something that will not require hours of exercise or changing one’s diet. What many don’t realize is that it is never that easy. One pill will not magically help you drop weight and keep it off. You may see quick weight loss results with a diet pill, but you will be severely jeopardizing your health. Is the risk worth it? Read on for details about this frightening trend in weight loss supplements.

The Truth Behind the Flashy Ads

If you pick up a bottle of a diet pill like Xenadrine, you could be wowed by all of their claims. Clinical studies? Safe? Improving metabolism? Customer testimonials? When things like this jump at you from off of the shelf, it is easy to be fooled. But like with any advertising claim, don’t be taken in by what you see on the surface. Steve Bechler, Major League baseball pitcher, took Xenadrine before a game, after he realized that he needed to drop some weight to have a healthy start to the season. One heart attack later and he passed away. As shocking as it is, this healthy 23 year old man didn’t know the dangers of diet supplements and paid the highest price. Look again at any packaging and marketing for a diet pill. They may magically claim to seed up metabolism and help the pounds melt away, but what significant research backs up these claims? Is there a reputable organization, like the Food and Drug Administration, asserting that the claims are true?

Take a supplement like Ephedra. It can be found everywhere, from weight loss aids to energy boosters. Metabolife, one of the best selling over-the-counter weight loss aids in the country, contains Ephedra. The supplement contains both Ephedra AND caffeine, which the manufacturers have claimed for years have no side effects when combined. Mind you, this is the company trying to market their product to millions of weight-conscious Americans, so you would think they would want to have their facts as straight as possible. However, when staring in the face of criminal charges and a federal investigation, the president of Metabolife, David Brown finally coped to the fact that “between 1997 and September 2001 his company received roughly 13,000 reports of ‘certain health-related issues‘ linked to the supplement, among them heart attacks, strokes, seizures and death. A subsequent analysis added high blood pressure, palpitations, psychosis and other serious problems.” The FDA even estimates that Ephrdra accounts for 64% of all related side effects from herbal supplements, and that for every one of these recorded incidents, 100 go unreported.

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