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Comment by UncleMeat | Hacker News Reader

I live in the US. I am a software engineer making more than a half a million annually. I have access to tremendous resources and can advocate for myself and my family. I live in a college town because of my wife's career. It is not a big city, but is also not rural middle of nowhere.

Getting a routine gynecological appointment for my wife any time in the next six months is impossible. I gave up on trying to get an appointment with an allergist for myself, even after getting a referral. What you describe is common in the US too, even for those with means. I cannot imagine what it is like for somebody who doesn't have money and insurance.

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Preach.

I wanted to get a sleep study done to get to the bottom of my occasional insomnia. My PCP at the time put in the pulmonologist referral (because this hospital network required a referral to get a sleep study done, which is insane in its own right, but that's neither here nor there).

This was in January. His next available appointment? March! For a friggin sleep study! And I have a HDHP + HSA and was going to pay full boat!

(He also prescribed me with an antipsychotic that can double as a sleep aid at low dosages, which I didn't take because five minutes of research into it made it obvious that taking that for extended periods of time is bad news bears. I stopped seeing him after that.)

(For those looking for answers like I was, I eventually stumbled upon Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia, or CBT-I. It's essentially a rigid sliding window-style sleep schedule plus challenge therapy to make you rethink how you approach sleep. I've been doing this for six months now and it has been transformational. Best part? No meds!)

FYI: I'm not a doctor and this isn't medical advice, but you can buy an APAP machine over the counter with money in your HSA, then hack around in it to figure out if you have sleep apnea and how bad it is if so

My wife got a sleep study done within 2 weeks of booking one, after she asked to be put on a cancellation list. Her actual appointment time was for end of October, scheduled about a month ago. You may need to be proactive and ask to be put on one, for some reason no one mentioned to her that there is one.

Well, no need to imagine any longer my friend. I have neither money nor insurance. My experience is identical to yours...other than that whole allergist thing. That's not something I would seek out answers on, as it is simple to figure out at home, and when you do get to an allergist, you will likely hear something very useless like "yeah you're allergic to at least some degree to these 17-25 different things; please try to limit exposure". :-D

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