ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, November 1, 1996 TAG: 9611010038
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
MEMO: ***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on November 4, 1996.
A scooter used by polio victim Linda Epperly was a gift from Shawn
Kirkland of Roanoke. A story in Friday's paper indicated it was paid for
by the insurance company.
THE EPPERLY FAMILY of Roanoke County worries about the future of Medicare and other health care programs. So do the candidates.
Linda Church Epperly had polio when she was 6 months old but had outgrown it by the time she was 12. Her left leg was 2 inches shorter than her right one, but she got rid of the "Frankenstein" shoes and leg braces and started to lead a normal life, she said.
Epperly married and had two children. Eight years ago, she and her husband, Charles, built their "dream" home in Southwest Roanoke County.
Then bad things started to happen.
In 1992, Charles Epperly had knee surgery for torn cartilage and was unable to return to his job at Norfolk Southern. The family income dropped from more than $50,000 to less than $25,000, Epperly said.
Adjustment was tough.
"Tell me who in America doesn't have a lifestyle connected to their income," Epperly said.
But more pressure was to come.
Epperly went to work to supplement her husband's disability pension. One day in 1995, while on a bathroom break from her job with Crestar Bank, Epperly fell and injured her right leg.
"It was the leg that had brought me through my whole life," she said.
She found life quite different without the strong leg to support the weak one. Muscles damaged by polio have no reserves, Epperly explained. If she gets overtired, she might be laid up for weeks, she said.
Epperly, who says she's constantly achy and sore, has been diagnosed with post-polio syndrome. The condition was identified as polio victims aged and the muscle weakness they had experienced as children re-emerged. The condition is common enough that clinics exclusively treating post-polio cases have popped up. One is at Sheltering Arms Rehabilitation Hospital in Richmond. A support group meets in the Roanoke Valley at Easter Seal.
At ages when many couples with grown children are looking toward greater freedom, Linda, 48, and Charles, 55, are bogged down with health problems coupled with financial worries. Since her fall at work was not job-related, she did not qualify for workers' compensation.
The couple owes "thousands and thousands" of dollars, which they are trying to repay at $300 a month, Epperly said.
Because they are buying a home, they aren't eligible for some assistance programs. But they have been lucky to get insurance through a health maintenance organization at $130 a month, she said.
Insurance paid 80 percent of $3,000 for a motorized scooter that has given Epperly mobility. However, some things aren't covered, such as a lift to load the scooter onto the family car.
When Epperly turned to the Virginia Department of Rehabilitation for help, she learned it couldn't help her unless she went to work. Her doctor said she couldn't work.
With help of the Blue Ridge Independent Living Center, however, Epperly got the shower bench and long shower hose that enable her to bathe without help. Epperly now has been approved to receive income from Social Security. As soon as it starts to come in, though, she will have to repay her former employer half of the disability money she has received.
It's just "so hard" sometime to get through the system, Epperly said. A person has a success and then a setback. It takes tremendous investments of time and emotions to do battle to get help, she said.
The Epperlys are making it now, barely. They worry about the long haul, though. Will the programs designed to protect people's health care and basic needs have any money left by the time she and her husband are eligible for them?
Here are what congressional candidates from the 6th District have to say about survival of health care programs and the Epperlys' concerns:
* Republican Rep. Bob Goodlatte says waste and fraud need to be eliminated in the Medicare program to help folk like Charles and Linda Epperly. Improving key health programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security disability is one of his priorities, he said.
* Democrat Jeff Grey, if elected, would set up a waste, fraud and abuse hot line for citizens to report Medicare fraud. He supports keeping the programs funded and the benefits they offer at the current level.
* Libertarian Jay Rutledge would like to auction federal property and buy guaranteed annuities to provide income for people retired or near retirement. He also would invest the portion of income now taken for Social Security in private retirement accounts. That would ease worry about Social Security cuts, he said.
Epperly said she welcomes any efforts to cut waste and to protect the old or disabled. But she said the politicians also need to keep in mind that sometimes it's the "small things" that would help people, and the various aid programs need to acknowledge those needs.
Examples she gave: More access to low-cost local transportation; she now pays $2.50 for a one-way trip on the local transport for the disabled.
She also would like to see faster response by federal programs; it took a year for Social Security to approve her disability application, which it did two months ago, but she still hasn't received the first check.
LENGTH: Long : 104 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. ERIC BRADY Staff A poster of a 1953 Roanokeby CNBWorld-News photo story on Linda Epperly hangs in the family's living
room.
2. ERIC BRADY Staff Linda Epperly of Roanoke County had polio as a
child and recovered; it has returned. color KEYWORDS: POLITICS CONGRESS