David Nagel: Candidate promised to bring sensibility to Concord, and has done so

To The Daily Sun,

I would like to thank my friends in Belknap County District 6 for allowing me to serve as their state representative. I promised to bring sensibility to Concord, and I have done that by providing the leadership needed to bring diverse groups of stakeholders together to successfully address complex social issues.

For the past 40 years, in my role as a physician and an author, I have advocated for the rights of those challenged by disabilities. I have promoted a patient-centered, integrative, whole person/whole life model of health care both in my own practice and beyond locally, regionally, nationally.

Increasingly, I have had to fight the very health care system that is supposed to be helping those I advocate for, one that has been taken over by what has come to be called the medical-industrial complex. The goal is no longer access to affordable care, but instead profit too often at the expense of the patient. Access to care is lacking. We face a crisis in those under-insured. Continuity of care is non-existent. Co-pays and deductibles skyrocket. Corporate hospital buy-outs damage community-based networks. Revered local doctors are fired. Those with complex medical problems struggle to find care.

The death of private health care practice is at the heart of this demise. I have been told these trends are inevitable, and I should accept them. That is something I refuse to do. My mission has brought me to the Statehouse determined to make meaningful change. By bringing light to these problems and proposing meaningful solutions that empower both patients and providers, we are slowly fighting back, and we are winning.

I ask for readers' votes on Nov. 5, to help me continue this mission. To learn more about what I am doing, please visit my website at drnagelfornh.com.

David Nagel

Gilmanton