OurHealthSystem.ca: New Website to help Canadians judge health care

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As I have previously stated, erectile I’m currently seeing a glaucoma specialist due to treatment complications when I was initially diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma. I’m very fortunate I did not lose my vision. Today’s appointment with my Glaucoma Specialist was a follow-up to September, viagra 40mg when I was put on eye drops in my right eye. This was due to the increased eye pressure in both eye, because I am on dexamethasone – a steroid.

I arrived at my eye specialist and after a little while my name was called. When I went in, his assistant checked my vision with an eye chart, then used a Silt Lamp Biomicroscope to look in my eyes, before checking my eye pressure.

Silt Lamp Biomicroscope

I’m happy to report that my eye pressure has decreased:

Today
Left eye – 17
Right eye – 13

September (put on eye drops)
Left eye – 21
Right eye – 25

January (pre-chemo)
Left eye – 16
Right eye – 14

I will continue to use Latanoprost eye drops for my right eye and I’m staying positive that my eye pressure will lower when I have my next appointment in 2014.

Just to give a recap, I am living with Multiple Myeloma (blood cancer). Since February 2013, I have been on my 4th chemo treatment called Velcade, which are weekly in-hospital injections, in addition to a variety of other pills I take to supplement my chemo treatment. You can read the background on my diagnosis and previous treatments on my blog.

BC Cancer Agency

 
Last week The Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) released an interactive tool, story
called OurHealthSystem.ca.

The website focuses on five themes:

• Access: While most Canadians are getting cancer radiation treatment in a timely fashion, waits are increasing for joint replacements.
• Quality of Care: A significant drop in hospital deaths suggests that the quality of hospital care is improving overall in Canada; however, 1 in 12 Canadians is readmitted to hospital within 30 days of discharge.
• Spending: Spending on health care varies greatly across the country, even after considering age differences in the population.
• Health Promotion and Disease Prevention: While smoking rates are declining in Canada, obesity rates continue to rise.
• Health Outcomes: Canadians are living longer than ever, but they are not benefiting equally from improvements in health.

There are infographics that summarise statistics – e.g. Number of Canadians that are diagnosed everyday with cancer (512) or life expectancy comparison for richer neighbourhoods (81 men, 84 women) vs poorer neighbourhoods (76 men, 82 women).

According to Jeremy Veillard, Vice President, Research and Analysis, CIHI:

This is the first website in Canada to contain the information Canadians said they wanted to know about their health system. Material is presented in an interactive way that allows people to easily understand how the health system is doing close to home but also at provincial and national levels.

BC Cancer Agency