Toni Cade Bambara Quotes

When I was growing up they used to say, "Robin, drugs can kill you." Now that I'm 58 my doctor's telling me, "Robin, you need drugs to live." I realize now that my doctor is also my dealer.

As a former professional patient advocate, I believe prescription drugs are an essential part of high-quality medical treatment, and I supported enactment of the Medicare Prescription Drug and Modernization Act.

I think the media can be a very positive influence by essentially holding people to task about the importance of high quality medical care. And when the media is scrutinizing you, then I think that's a very good, positive thing for the field of medicine.

If you explain to a patient what can be done and what might be the downsides, let the patient choose; don't have ethicists, priests, or doctors say you may or may not have replacement cells.

Often doctors didn't even tell you what was wrong with you. They just treated you, and sent you home.

I am a huge advocate of prescription drugs given wisely and for the right reasons and the right diagnosis and also psychotherapy.

Nearly all men die of their medicines, not of their diseases.

Should women be on any pills besides birth control? We should just give them all sugar pills for everything, they're so suggestible.

We have really good data that show when you take patients and you really inform them about their choices, patients make more frugal choices. They pick more efficient choices than the health care system does.

If doctors just spent more time with their patients so they felt more reassured, that might help.

My doctor explained that exercise and diet changes might help and that I also might need a medication.

Pain was something we were expected to endure. But I doubt very much if you would be entirely happy today if a doctor threw a towel in your face and jumped on you with a knife.

When I was born in 1970 with a rare genetic disorder called spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita (SED), medical science wasn't what it is today and my mum and dad were treated terribly by the medical profession.

When I told my doctor I couldn't afford an operation, he offered to touch-up my X-rays.

From routine hospital visits and prescription drugs, to emergencies and hospice care, Medicare covers the full range of health services that our nation's seniors rely on every single day.

Informed consent is required for every invasive medical procedure, from getting your ears pierced to having an abortion.

Today the demands are for even higher standards in the quality of care, for greater flexibility and convenience in treatment times, and for more prevention through screening and health checks.

There's a lot of arrogance in the medical community. There are good, reliable websites you can go to for information - the Mayo Clinic, the Cleveland Clinic, Johns Hopkins.

We would like doctors to listen, but the fact is, we better be ready to be able to talk to them. You're going to have to be an active participant in that conversation, so I'd say the American people are going to need ways of stepping up to the conversation.

Medication can help us live a happier life.

There's an opportunity for the pharmacist to play a much greater role in health care, especially with what we have going on in this country with the shortage of primary-care physicians.

No doctor should ever have to call an insurance man to ask permission to treat a patient who is standing right there.

Doctors no longer charge patients, patients no longer pay doctors, and neither determines what is medically necessary.

No health care provider may be penalized for discussing medically necessary or appropriate care with or on behalf of his or her patient.

I am not prepared to explain to a sick child with cystic fibrosis, facing death and fighting for breath, the ethical grounds that hinder the science which could save him.