patients or people?

[george boyer]

Talking about getting away from being a 'patient' for the rest of your
life......here is ONE thing for us amputees which needs clarifying.
'Residual limb' is a medical term......face it, STUMPS 'R' US!!  Any
amputee who has a 'residual limb' is at risk for being a patient
forever.  And if we are going to stake our claim and dig in our heels
about top notch prosthetic care we have to get out of being 'patients'
as quickly as possible.  Getting that doctor's locution (way of
speaking) out of our heads is an absolute!  Being viewed as patients
gives them (unscrupulous prosthetists, insurance bean counters, etc.)
carte blanche to ignore and exploit us as they wish...anything but
listen to us.

An amputation produces a 'residual limb' for a doctor, who speaks
medicalese of necessity, and for a queasy newbie, who very often wants
to deny in any way possible what has happened.  But for the rest of us
amputees what we have is a stump, plain and simple....and we buy a limb
or a leg or an arm which will hopefully fit our stump comfortably.  And
we use them both, stump and leg or arm, day in and day out....we are
just people going about our daily things, people, NOT PATIENTS any more.
Our mantra is STUMPS 'R' US!!
George B.