Aug. 13--People featured in this column have been selected randomly from the telephone book.
GENESEE -- For the past 26 years, Susie Carlstrom has literally kept her finger on the pulse of health care in the region. And she's noticed some trends.
"I think people are heavier. And I think everybody is on a diet, including me," Susie says. "And the complaints are almost always the same -- blood pressure, stress. There was a period when just about everybody I met was taking antidepressants. Now more people take pain pills."
Susie, 56, offers this assessment from a rare perspective.
"I'm a private contracting paramedical examiner. I've actually been doing it for 26 years. I work for the insurance industry and I've worked in this area long enough that I have probably 90 percent of the market share."
So, if you live on the Palouse or in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley and are applying for private life, health, long-term care or disability insurance, Susie will likely be calling to make an appointment, then travel to your home, knock on your door, draw blood, get a urine sample, record vital signs and ask a lot of questions.
"And I have another business which is also kind of interesting. I have a salon where I do permanent makeup."
Check out Susie's eyebrows and eyeliner. They're tattoos.
"It's kind of my hobby job. It's called Permanent Makeup by Susie. I've been doing that for four years."
If nothing else, Susie, a wife, a mother of two grown children and grandmother of three, says her permanent makeup, which she applied to herself, helps her get a head start every morning on her real job.
"I get up at 4 a.m. I do my paperwork and my billing before my first appointment at 6:30. So I leave my house at about 5:45. And my last appointment is at 1 p.m. Then I come back and I have at least two hours of handling the blood and urine specimens, getting them ready to be shipped that day (by Federal Express). Then I e-mail the insurance agents to let them know the work is completed. And then I start calling people to schedule more appointments."
On average, Susie, who was trained as a licensed practical nurse, examines between seven and eight people a day, four days a week. That converts into about 35,000 miles of travel annually and contact with more than 1,500 people -- or around 40,500 people and nearly a million miles over the past quarter-century.
"The greatest blessing of my job is that it's been a pathway into people's lives," Susie says, explaining that she's naturally gregarious. "The downside is I'm really tough on a car. I just drive them until they won't drive anymore. And since I'm self-employed, nobody pays me mileage."
Nor, ironically, does Susie have her own health insurance. She is covered, however, on her husband's policy. Ken Carlstrom manages the Wilbur-Ellis Co. plant here.
Born in Weiser, Susie was raised in the Seattle area by her parents, Bill and Louise Maxwell. She credits them for passing on an unwavering work ethic. "I am just a worker bee. I like hard work. I was raised by two really hard-working people. And my husband is a hard worker. And our kids are hard workers." She and Ken have a 25-year-old son, Kelly Carlstrom, and a 38-year-old daughter, Heather Meyer, who, with her husband Tom, have given Susie three grandchildren -- Chelsea, 19, Jake, 15 and Haley, 13.
"We adopted a baby in 1986 from Korea. And when we adopted the baby, there was an ad in the paper for a paramedical examiner," Susie says, recalling how she wanted to stay with the baby but still work. "I didn't realize it was going to take me 25 years to build a business. And now the baby is 25 years old and he's the director of the Boys and Girls Club in Lewiston, Kelly Carlstrom."
Whether its her family or the thousands of people she's examined, Susie says health care, health insurance and recent health care reform initiatives are on the minds of everyone. She declines, however, to offer her opinion. "I don't want to be on the record for that. It's too political."
Suffice it to say she has strong opinions based on her years of experience, but prefers to concentrate on her job. And for the record, nobody has to remove their clothes. "It's just a brief health history. Routine vital signs. Blood and urine. And often an EKG."
Most importantly, Susie says, people need to answer her questions truthfully and to the point.
"They are legal documents," she says of the forms that are filled out. "What's vital is for people to listen to the questions exactly as they are asked and answer accordingly."
Twenty-five years ago, she explains, insurance companies pretty much referred insurance applicants to local doctors. She happened to be around when paramedical examiners were just getting started. And thanks to many insurance agents and companies who keep calling, Susie says she continues to have a job, even in the current recession.
"I'm the only one still standing," she says of the niche she's established, "because it really doesn't pay great. You make money in volume. I've seen a lot of changes in the last 25 years."
Johnson may be contacted at djohnson@lmtribune.com or (208) 883-0564.
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