First do no harm... unless you're fat
A woman who weighed about 250 lbs was dropped by her doctor for being fat. The "Doctor", Helen Carter decided to pull a number out of the air about what weight is too much for her to see. The magic number is 200. The reason is apparently her staff was bench pressing fat people and some got injured.
Actually that isn't true, but "Dr" Carter has claimed people in her practice have been injured by those pesky fatties. One incident was a doctor was seriously injured pulling out a foot rest for a woman who weighed 280 (Please someone who knows the case elaborate on this because I'm not sure how a person's weight effects pulling out a foot rest. Was the patient sitting on the foot rest?)
She did recommend fat patients go to Obesity Centers. Marianne Kirby remarked on Obesity centers:
An obesity center, for those not in on the medical language of fatness, is not going to provide the same services as a primary care physician. An obesity center is not where a fat person goes when they have the flu. No, this primary care physician, who is meant to be treating the whole patient as a general care provider, is saying that patients really ought to go to that diet place down the road. Obesity centers are focused on weight loss through dieting, supplemented by weight loss surgery. None of that is going to deal with your hay fever or whatever else you’d go to your primary physician for.
The woman who was turned away, Ida Davison happens to be around my height and weight. I have never injured a medical professional, I have never damaged equipment. Many doctors (even the fat hating ones) have pulled out footrests without sustaining a life-threatening injury) If I told Helen Carter my history over the phone without mentioning my weight, I bet she would see me. I also have to wonder if she would see a man who was muscular but happened to weigh more than 200. Oh wait, the 200 lbs number is for women only.
If the injuries were to patients as Marianne Kirby mentioned in her article, I have, in fact, been injured. About 15 or so years ago, I went to a lab to get blood tests and I was stabbed repeatedly by several phlebotomists trying to get blood. Finally they used a big ass needle. Many doctors might blame that on my being fat. However I've never had an experience like that in any other lab or doctor's office. The issue wasn't me but the lack of skilled phlebotomists at this lab. It's easy to blame fat people when actually it's the doctor's office who either doesn't have skilled people or are unwilling to make a reasonable accommodation.
NAAFA puts out a great brochure for Doctors dealing with fat patients. It's not just a matter of equipment, but a matter of respect. Something "Doctor" Carter seems to be lacking in.
Recently a study came out indicating that $750 billion is wasted in the health care system. Some of it is fraud but about 210 million of it was unnecessary services. I had to wonder how much of this "Unnecessary services" was where the so called "obesity costs" come from. I have to wonder how many doctors see their fat patients and assume that they have all of the "fat related diseases". How many healthy fat people have gotten tests they didn't need?
