There’s certainly plenty we don’t agree on in the blogosphere–but plenty we do. That our primary care system is falling apart; that our Emergency Departments are severely overcrowded; that some laws and regulations (HIPAA, EMTALA, among others) need some serious re-thinking; that our health care system as it currently stands may seriously fail its citizens, especially with the coming-of-age of the baby boomers. The list could go on.

And yet our representatives in Washington have done nothing, and are not listening. (Granted they have plenty of issues on our plate–but if this one is not addressed soon, it’ll be too late. It may already be.)

So I say let’s stage a sit-in.

Of a certain variety, of course. We can’t simply ignore our patients. Many often depend on us to keep them… alive.

I suggest we demand all of Congress to spend a week of their vacation with the health care US health care system. Where and how we work in the United States, they sit and watch. 2 days with a primary care physician. 2 days with specialists. A day in the ED. And follow a patient from admission to discharge.

They’ll see how swamped we are; they’ll see how sick our patients are, what treatments are recommended for them, and how it’s impossible to provide proper care in 15 minutes. They’ll see how overcrowded our hospitals are. And that we must. Do. Something.

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