Dialysis Act would give patients more stability, options
I was first diagnosed with kidney failure in 2005 and immediately started emergency dialysis. It was a shock, but I wasn’t about to let it stop me. I began peritoneal dialysis (PD) at home so I could keep working as a teacher and a detention center tutor. Even while managing treatment, I continued to show up for my students every day.
After a successful kidney transplant in 2015, I got almost 10 years of freedom from dialysis. But when my transplanted kidney began to fail again in 2023, I returned to PD late last year. I’m back on the transplant list, and while dialysis is exhausting, it’s what keeps me alive. I still travel, teach and stay positive because kidney disease shouldn’t define my life.
Unfortunately, too many dialysis patients face unnecessary financial stress that makes it harder to stay healthy and hopeful. A recent Supreme Court decision has made it easier for insurance companies to limit coverage for dialysis, forcing patients off private plans before they’re ready. That means less stability and fewer options for those already dealing with so much.
That’s why I’m urging Congress to support the Restore Protections for Dialysis Patients Act (House Resolution 2199). This bill would restore the 30 months of private insurance coverage patients used to have, giving them time to focus on their health, plan for the future, and pursue a transplant without being buried in medical debt.
Dialysis patients like me work hard to live full, meaningful lives. Congress should do its part to help us keep it that way.
DWAN DOBSON, ELLENWOOD
Guest columnist was right about Trump’s talk at Cobb school
Dr. John Terry’s comments concerning Trump’s recent duplicitous political rally — posing as an address in Cobb County about education — are profound and deserve praise (“Damage from Trump’s Cobb County visit lingers for students and teachers,” Aug. 25).
John Terry is to be commended for exposing the double talk of a con man desperately trying to act presidential.
LEN COSTOPOULOS, DALLAS
Worst of both sides on display for midterm elections
Once again, it’s time to endure the political wit of both Democrats vs. Republicans, on every media source.
Consider: The GOP candidates still bending their backs to their man with the leaden touch in the White House, deafeningly silent at one blunder after another. And the holier-than-thou right, whose “fiscal conservative” agendas are making it harder each day for working citizens and this nation to make ends meet.
Or the Democrats, who never have owned giving the presidency to the GOP because their own candidate couldn’t find his way to the stage, and also because they were afraid to stand up to the far left’s ideas of the American Way.
So once again, it’s time to vote against the worst of the lot.
E. MARTIN, PEACHTREE CITY
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