Schoolboy deaf for nine years regains hearing after cotton bud pops out of his ear
Yet one more argument to avoid Socialized Medicine at all cost….read on…from today’s Daily Mail. This is the kind of healtcare you get when you go to a system like this…
A school boy who was deaf for nine years was suddenly cured - when a cotton wool bud suddenly popped out of his ear.
Jerome Bartens, 11, was diagnosed as deaf in his right ear when he was just two. He struggled at school, couldn’t hear the TV properly and was fed up with people having to shout at him.
But when playing pool with his friends in a church hall Jerome felt a sudden pop. He put his finger in his ear and there was the tip of a cotton wool bud which had been wedged there for almost 10 years.
His family believe Jerome was a toddler when he put the cotton bud in his ear and the centimetre-long cotton tip came off the plastic stem.
Jerome’s dad Carsten, 45, said: “It was just incredible - his hearing returned to normal in an instant. He was cured as suddenly as he became deaf. I had always suspected Jerome had stuck something in his ear when he was little and that was causing the problem. But the doctors and hearing specialists said it was wax and he would probably grow out of it.
“I am amazed they didn’t spot something as obvious as a cotton wool bud.”
Jerome has kept the waxy cotton bud as a souvenir of his nine years of silence on his right.
His family believe that as he grew the bud has been forced out - and finally came out nine years later.
Single dad Carsten, of Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, has now complained to his GP and hearing specialists who examined Jerome over the years.
He said: “It has held Jerome back in school and caused him problems in communicating with his friends.”
Lorry driver Carsten - who has two older daughters Takita, 16, and Tiffany, 14, - says he’s “thrilled” that Jerome’s hearing has come back.
He said: “If he was playing down the garden I would have to shout for him eight or nine times before he would respond.
“But now he has 100 per cent hearing and he’s just a normal boy again.”
Jerome is due to be examined by hearing experts later this week - and his dad is taking along the cotton wool bud as proof of his “miracle cure”.
The schoolboy said: “I can hear much better now and I think I’ll be much happier at school now my ear does not ache all the time.
“I was just playing pool in the church hall when my ear made a popping noise. It was very strange at first to be able to hear everything.
“But now I’m getting used to it - it’s great that people don’t have to shout to me or that I don’t have to turn my head all the time.”
January 28th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
The system is a joke now ask any parent!
January 28th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Great point, SgtMac!!
Because there certainly never has been any hint of incompetent doctors or malpractice here in the US!!
And how are we going to compete globally if generations of US children cannot hear!?!?
January 28th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
What?
January 28th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
JohnKonop: It’s called sarcasm (it’s a liberal thing).
January 28th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
LOL
January 28th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
So John, you’re saying you approve of this level of care?
Big Bird……why not come “out of the closet?” Everyone knows your cowardly drivel.
January 28th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
Sgt Mac
I am saying this is the level of care we are all getting now!
January 28th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Incomplete information makes this commentary difficult. It is not clear from what is written in the post, whether the child saw an otolaryngologist. The term “hearing specialist” doesn’t necessarily indicate that. I did a Google search, and, as far as I can tell, there are otolaryngology services available for children in this section of Wales. How difficult these services are to access, I just don’t know. If the socialized system in the UK makes it very difficult to actually obtain these services, then I guess you can lay some of the blame for this series of events on the system itself. However, I remind you of my previous statement: Because the Brits do not operate their single payer system properly does not disqualify the system, which I have developed in my book, EQUAL HEALTH CARE FOR ALL, from being a true definitive solution for the health care misery in America. The Brits have problems, I believe, because they let the dollar bill direct their health care. Only when health care, the doctor—patient relationship, operates independently from interference and obstruction by the payer, will good solutions evolve. Indeed, this treating health care as a business is the root of our problems with our multi-payer system. I believe the Brits have taken this same fundamental flaw and transposed it onto their single payer. In my system, the doctor—patient relationship free of interference from the payer directs health care expenditutre. The vastly increased demand, which will occur and which I view as a solution instead of a problem, will be paid for by the single payer controlling the cost (price paid) for services and product in advance and not by rationing care and/or creating waiting lines. Enough about systems.
Getting back to this particular case, I think it is important to question the functioning of the doctor—patient relationship. I will presume that the doctor who saw the child at two years old had some pediatric training. It does seem that the doctor should have made this diagnosis. Kids regulary stick objects in their ears and swallow things. Also, there could have been the problem of an overzealous parent trying to clean the child’s ear. It seems that the doctor just missed it. That happens sometimes. Doctors don’t always get it right. But I do not think that this can be blamed on the health care system itself, but rather on the work input of the doctor into the doctor—patient relationship. In other words, the doc missed it. I do not know if this rises to the level of incompetence. Hindsight provides 20/20 vision but doesn’t clarify the circumstances at the time in question. It also seems bizarre to me that any child or parent of the child would persist with a chronic earache for 9 years. So I must question the input of the patient, or in this case the patient’s parents, into the doctor—patient relationship. What is also not clear is whether, as the problem persisted, the child was seen by an otolaryngologist. If he was and the problem was still missed, then I question competency. If he was not, then the problem could lie with the system itself.
Perhaps while thinking about this, people will come to agree with my conclusion that the doctor—patient relationship, which very frequently requires specialty referral, must be the director of health care expenditutre and not be obstructed by the payer’s dollar bill limitations as occurs in our American multi-payer system and in the British and Canadian socialized single payer systems.
R. Garth Kirkwood MD
http://www.equalhealthcareforall.com
doctork@equalhealthcareforall.com
January 28th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Here, here!
I want my doctor to be motivated by profits first, good care second. Forget about the hippocratic oath. The almighty dollar is the only thing my doctor need worry about.
January 29th, 2008 at 12:03 am
No, Captain Menace. It is the doctor—patient relationship that directs health care expenditure in my system, not the doctor. There is a distinct, substantial difference between the two as I explain fully in Chapter 2 of my book. If your level of interest and time committment allows for more than cynicism, try reading it.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:20 am
Sorry doc, cynicism is just about all I have time for these days.
My three jobs keep me busy when I’m not blogging. God bless America.
January 29th, 2008 at 8:05 am
Doc Kirkwood:
re: “It is the doctor—patient relationship that directs health care expenditure in my system.”
psst. Your system doesn’t even exist except in your book. Sorta like my system of rock concert management. Except I haven’t written a book about it yet. So I guess you’re one step ahead of me.
January 29th, 2008 at 8:54 am
Hey guess what doc. “earwax removal” is all over the internet. Just google it. It beats the hell out of socialism.
January 29th, 2008 at 10:49 am
Doc - Are you kidding me? You said
“It also seems bizarre to me that any child or parent of the child would persist with a chronic earache for 9 years. So I must question the input of the patient, or in this case the patient’s parents,”
Now you’re going to blame the patient (a 2-yr old child) and the parent for actually BELIEVING what two “doctors” told them the diagnosis was? That’s a joke right?
I’m glad you’re not MY doctor or my kids’ doctor. You’d probably blame us when you missed the broken bone, pulled muscle, etc. etc.
The British NHS is a socialized system providing ZERO incentive for anyone to excel. This is the standard of care one could expect if we were to adopt such a system. The average citizen waits months or years to see a specialist, gets treated like cattle, than gets blamed when the doctor either misses the diagnosis completely or calls it wrong.
Here’s a thought Doc, if YOU want to treat people for free, at a reduced price, or whatever, and you think it’s a sacred duty to treat illegal criminal aliens, please feel free to do so and leave the rest of us alone. We are not now, have never been, and God willing will never be a socialist Nation.
January 31st, 2008 at 8:26 am
http://tinyurl.com/34dg52