Obligatory Health Linkage Friday April 11
Obese Pregnant Women More Likely to Use Healthcare Services
“For instance, for prenatal visits with a physician, normal women had an average of about four visits, while very obese and extremely obese women had five and six visits. The primary reasons for the increased utilization of these services were increases in Caesarean section and obesity-related high risk conditions. Caesarean delivery rates were 45.2 percent for extremely obese women, compared to 21.3 percent for normal weight women.”
Here’s something that I’d appreciate having explained to me: the majority of US citizens are not on any kind of state or federal healthcare plan. I’d say around 80% are on some kind of group insurance plan via their employers where the healthcare is managed through a private company. And yes, excess and unnecessary use of healthcare does drive up the costs for everyone on that group plan. But how would that raise costs for taxpayers, if it’s not funded by taxes in the first place? Seriously, what am I missing here? I’m well aware that there’s a huge problem with people who don’t get insurance at all because a job pays too much for aid, but is too cheap/too small/too part-time to offer coverage benefits, but I’d still pinpoint those individuals as less than 20% of the total healthcare system. So either A, I’m missing some information or B, this “strain” on the healthcare system is about something that has nothing to do with strain – such as corporate profit for the companies that supply weight loss drugs and other equipment to hospitals.
I have been pregnant twice, and both times I was no doubt considered obese. I went to the doctor EXACTLY as many times as the doctor told me to show up there. Who the hell goes to the doctor for fun anyway??
And also, only four (or five or six) prenatal visits?? Around here, you go once a month until the last month, then every week and finally every day if you still haven’t popped. That’s everyone, not just obese women. Where was this study done, anyway?
Yeah, I don’t think this was a very well-done study at all. When I got pregnant the first time (at 17), I saw the doctor once a month until my last month, then I saw him once a week (and I was fat, and in a Catholic home for unwed mothers). I went into labor on my due date, and had a normal delivery, in spite of weighing 235 lbs at the time (at 5′9″). My second pregnancy, I didn’t even see a doctor until I was 8 months along, and I saw him once a week for 6 weeks (I was two weeks late and went into labor the day he was going to induce). That was also a normal delivery with no complications, and I weighed 325 lbs at the time. So all this hysteria about fat women having complicated pregnancies is most likely a crock of crap. I’ve known too many fat women who’ve had no problems with their pregnancies and didn’t need Caesarean sections to have their babies (I think that’s a fat-phobic doctor’s way of avoiding our fat private bits).