[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 25801-25802]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              HEALTH CARE

  (Mr. BRADY of Texas asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BRADY of Texas. Mr. Speaker, over the past few months, we have 
held over 50 town hall meetings and forums on health care reform in our 
district. Recently, we held one in The Woodlands with a panel of 
doctors to talk about health care. One of them was Dr. Peter Shedden, a 
Canadian-born neurosurgeon, who practices in The Woodlands. He was 
trained in Canada, is very complimentary about the way they trained 
physicians. He shared his experiences.
  He told us how his father died after he was refused kidney dialysis, 
even as the disease entered the acute phase, because he was over 70 
years old. He told us, ``You've got to know somebody'' to get to the 
front of the line. He said, ``There are no second opinions in the 
Canadian system . . . After age 70, if you get sick, you're done.''
  Because of the long waiting lists, he told us ER doctors are forced 
to make a quick evaluation of whether or not someone is ``salvageable'' 
when they come in the door. He said, ``Within 48 hours, you'd better 
show you are going to improve; otherwise, your breathing tube is taken 
out and you move on . . . because there is nowhere for you to go.'' He 
also said many patients come from Canada to Texas to seek his 
treatment.

[[Page 25802]]

  So before we go to a national, government-run system, I have one 
question for those proponents of that bill: When was the last time you 
went to Canada for your health care?

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