Don’t Keep the Doctor Away
As citizens continue to let the pandemic settle in, it’s easy to see how the virus has affected our everyday lives. In some respects, the average person has less of a risk of becoming ill as our exposure to others has drastically declined. On the other hand, some of the people who we’ve stopped seeing may not be one’s worth shutting out after all.
According to a recent analysis of millions of insurance claims, the initial stage of the pandemic corresponded with a serious decline in preventative and elective health-care use. Patients failed to do their checkups and do their health tests. For example, compared to the months of April and May of 2019, use of colonoscopies (a way to screen for colon cancer) fell by 70%.
It’s important to consider the idea that just because patients haven’t gone to see their doctors in person, does that mean that they also didn’t communicate online?
Telemedicine is indeed on the rise, but it was said that it didn’t make up for the reduced in-person visits.
Mammograms and Pap smears dropped by 80% in April year over year. Since then, the numbers have rallied, and more and more people have begun to rush to get their tests done too. In a pandemic packed environment, is it appropriate to throw your regular health check-ups on the backburner and focus all your energy on you and your family? Or should things like cancer screenings remain at the top of the priority list regardless of what is happening in the world?
I am not a financial advisor and my comments should never be taken as financial advice. Investments come with risk, so always do your research and analysis beforehand.
