When you hear "arthritis" typically you picture a person in their later stages of life.  You don't picture a four year old child.  Yet arthritis can and does impact young lives just as much if not more then it would impact senior citizens.

Meet Hannah.  Hannah is a beautiful little 4 year old girl that lives a not far from where my family lives in Merrimack.  She was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis at 3 years old.  Her mother recaps how they discovered this on her blog site dedicated to bringing awareness to the illness.

Sometime in September 2006, I asked Hannah to hold up her hands on our chalk board so I could trace them.  To my surprise she could not hold her left hand flat against the board.  I tried to gently push her wrist down and was faced with some serious tension.  I made a mental note and checked it a few days later with no change.  Even checking it at night, while she was in a deep sleep, we were unable to bend her wrist.  Any force on our part, caused serious pain.  We were stumped and worried.

We saw our doctor who ruled out any kind of injury or break in bones that may have fused together.  We were then referred to a pediatric orthopedist, who, upon viewing Hannah's X-Rays, informed us that Hannah's wrist bones were growing at the rate of a 6 year old (she was 3 years old at the time).  The condition that causes this?  Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis.  I had heard of Rheumatoid Arthritis in older people, but kids?  

We were then referred to a rheumatologist who confirmed her JRA diagnosis in December '06.

46 Million Americans suffer from arthritis. Nearly 300,000 children in this country alone have been diagnosed with some form of arthritis of which, the most prevalent form JRA effects around 50,000.  Despite this you hear very little of it.

Over the years both Republicans and Democrats have put up bills to try to aim more research funds and awareness at the illness but year after year, bill after bill they continue to be shot down or as in this most recent attempt, simply abandoned in committee.

A young man that I work with also suffers from arthritis.  As I began my preparation for this article I spoke briefly to him about the illness to get his take on why it is such a forgotten disease.  His theory, the attention to the disease is not there because no one dies from arthritis.  That however doesn't make it any less tragic on the families who must deal with this disease in their lives. 

I then asked my wife if she knew about JRA and she mentioned a girl who came to her school in 8th grade named Sharon.  In good years she was on crutches, but the majority of her time in Middle and High School was spent in a wheel chair.  Her knees and ankles were always swollen and her hands and wrists were flared up a lot--preventing her from using the crutches to support her. 

I can only imagine what this disease must be like for the parents.  Imagine having to give your child shots as Hannah's parents must do. Imagine not being able to do simple games like tracing your child's hand on a piece of paper because the flexibility is gone as Hannah's was in her wrist.  Imagine being a child with this illness and not living near a major city with specialists. Hannah at least has access to specialists in Boston.

This illness is real and it affects people every day.  You can help though.  On May 10th Hannah and her family are taking part in a walk to both raise awareness of this disease and to help raise money toward finding a cure. 

Click HERE and you can donate online.   Hannah's goal is to raise $1000 in donations.  At the time of my writing this she's already raised $475.  My hope is that those reading this article will help assure that not only will little Hannah and her family meet the goal of the $1000 they seek to raise, but far exceed it.

Concord Monitor ran an article today about Sen. Bob Clegg and how he's recently started to slim down.  It's great to hear that he is beginning to focus on his health but in doing so he's put up a bill to require insurance companies to cover obesity surgeries such as the one he recently had.  Sorry but this is a case of good intentions leading to bad results.

For starters it's fixing a problem that doesn't really exist in that in NH only Cigna doesn't cover the procedure in every one of its plans so the other insurance companies already cover it.

The article in the Monitor points out that his surgery cost $20,000.  So if we force insurance companies to pay for that we open the door to force them to pay for other procedures we see as important.   Where exactly will the money to cover it come from?  With the growing number of obese people in this country more and more people will opt to get the treatment putting more and more burden on the insurance companies, this will result in higher insurance rates for those of us who stay healthy and don't need the surgery in the first place.

Let's for sake of argument say that this procedure will save 10% of those getting it from having more serious heart problems later on in life.  And let's say those heart problems cost an average of $40,000 in medical procedures per person depending on the problem.  So if 200 people get the surgery at $20,000 that's 48 million.  10% would be 20 people and the savings would be only $800,000 which is far less then the $8 million paid up front.  That means the $7.2 million additional spent money would come from our insurance payments making it more expensive for all of us.

Now if it can be argued that the $8 million results in a savings of $20 million, well now it would make economic sense for the insurance companies to do it because they would pay out less in the long run and it would make sense for us because our rates could then go down.  But if that were the case there would be no need for the government to strong arm the companies in the first case (which based on the fact only 1 company doesn't cover it, may already be the case). 

That all said though, lets look deeper at the underlying problem here. The cost of obesity in this country takes its tolls in other ways as well.  The town of Gilmanton are currently looking to spend $15,812 for new equipment because their current equipment is not deemed suitable for those over 300 pounds.

Tim McGinley, Concords acting fire chief points out the following in the article linked below:

"People who are overweight also suffer from heart disease, breathing difficulties," he said. "We've adapted as much as we can equipment-wise."

So as more and more Americans pack on those extra pounds eating twinkiees and getting their meals biggie sized the cost of their health care continues to rise.  As a result we simply shift that cost to the rest of us who do control our weight and eat healthier.

What's the answer?  Do we get the government to reward those who pack on the pounds in the first place by paying for surgery to correct their self inflicted problem?  Do we punish those who stay healthy by giving them the choice of either paying for more expensive medical equipment to handle obese people or pay for the surgery to correct their problems?

Maybe we need to look to get this country back into the idea of self accountability.