Jeffrey S. Barkin, MD, DLFAPA, is a practicing psychiatrist in Portland and the former president of Maine Medical Association. He co-hosts “A Healthy Conversation” on WGAN.

One day, without warning, you will need the health care system to work. It may be a child with a fever that will not break. A spouse who slips on ice. A parent who forgets where they are. A phone call that comes too early in the morning or too late at night.

When that moment arrives, you will not care about party slogans. You will not care about yard signs or social media posts. You will care about whether help is there.

That moment is why voting matters.

Every election season, we are urged to pick a side. Stay loyal. Vote the way you always have. The names change. The ads change. The faces change. But the message remains the same: this is a team sport. That message is tempting. It feels safe. It saves time. You do not have to read much. You do not have to compare records. You do not have to risk disappointment.

But voting is not about comfort. And it is not about loyalty. Voting is about protecting your life, your family’s future and the systems you depend on when things go wrong. Few systems matter more than health care.

Health care is not an abstract policy debate. It is not a line in a budget. It is the doctor who answers the phone when your child spikes a fever at midnight. It is the emergency department that treats your spouse after a fall. It is the pharmacy where you pick up insulin, blood pressure medication or antidepressants. It is the therapist who helps your teenager through a hard year. It is the home health aide who allows your parent to remain at home rather than enter a nursing facility.

When candidates vote on health care, they are voting on these moments. Those votes shape what happens when your family needs help. That is true no matter what letter appears next to a candidate’s name.

Too often, people vote the way they cheer for a football team. They support the team closest to home. Or the one they grew up with. Even when the team keeps losing, they stay loyal. They explain away mistakes. They blame the referees. Loyalty becomes the goal.

But voting is not a game. Your health is not a season record. Your family does not get a rematch if the outcome is bad.

Imagine choosing a quarterback only because he wears your hometown colors, even though he throws interceptions every week and cannot complete short passes. No one would accept that in sports. No one would accept it in business. No one would accept it in medicine. Yet many people accept it in elections.

A nonpartisan approach does not mean being neutral or disengaged. It means being informed. It means asking clear questions and expecting honest answers.

Start with a simple one: did this candidate support policies that protect or improve access to health care? That question cuts through speeches, slogans and ads.

Did the candidate vote to protect coverage for people with preexisting conditions? Did they support expanding affordable coverage for working families who earn too much to qualify for assistance but not enough to pay full price? Did they back stable insurance networks so patients would not lose their doctors overnight? Did they support funding for rural hospitals, community clinics, emergency services and mental health care?

These are not opinions. They are recorded votes. They leave a paper trail.

Over the past decade, lawmakers across the country have faced repeated decisions about expanding or restricting access to affordable health care for working families. In states where expansion moved forward, people received preventive care earlier. Fewer problems escalated into emergencies. Hospitals carried less uncompensated care. Small businesses found it easier to keep employees healthy and working.

In states where expansion stalled or failed, families delayed care. Hospitals absorbed greater losses. Premiums rose to fill the gap. Emergency departments became the safety net of last resort. These effects appeared quickly, not years later. The outcomes were not ideological. They were practical. They showed up in waiting rooms and hospital hallways.

Mental health care tells a similar story.

Mental health is frequently praised on the campaign trail. It is less reliably protected once budgets are written. Some candidates support enforcing parity laws that require insurers to cover mental health care the same way they cover physical care. Others vote against enforcement, allowing narrow networks and long waits to persist.

The results are familiar. A loved one needs help, but no inpatient bed is available. Therapy is technically covered, but no provider is accepting new patients. A treatable condition becomes a crisis. Emergency rooms fill. Families scramble. These outcomes are not accidents. They follow policy decisions.

Voting by record means looking at what candidates did when decisions were hard and attention was low. Voting by policy means reading past slogans. Lower costs sound good. How will costs be lowered? More choice sounds good. Who actually gets that choice? Efficiency sounds good. At whose expense?

A serious candidate should be able to explain how their health care proposals affect seniors, children, rural families, hospitals, people with chronic illness and caregivers. If a candidate cannot explain it clearly, that matters.

This kind of voting takes effort, but far less than people fear. It means spending a few minutes reviewing a voting record. It means reading one independent summary instead of relying on ads. It means asking one direct question about access, coverage or cost.

You do not need to agree with a candidate on every issue. Democracy does not require perfection. It requires judgment. Health care makes this especially clear because the stakes are so high. A delayed road project can be fixed later. A tax policy can be adjusted. But delayed cancer screening, untreated depression or a closed rural hospital cannot always be undone.

Some worry that voting this way means betraying a party or a tradition. It does not. Parties exist to serve people, not the other way around. Loyalty makes sense when it delivers results. It makes less sense when it excuses failure.

Others worry that focusing on issues instead of teams creates confusion. In reality, it creates accountability. When voters pay attention to records, candidates notice. They learn that slogans are not enough. They learn that follow-through matters.

It also improves conversations. Instead of arguing about teams, people can talk about outcomes. Did this policy keep hospitals open? Did it protect access to care? Did it help families afford treatment? Those are adult questions. They deserve adult answers.

Health care is foundational. Without health, education suffers. Without health, work suffers. Without health, families fracture under strain.

Before you vote, learn who the candidates are — not just their names or their signs, but their records. Look at how they voted when the cameras were off. Look at what they supported when it was inconvenient.

Ask yourself one final question: Did this candidate work to protect my access to care and my family’s stability? If the answer is yes, that matters. If the answer is no, that matters even more.

Voting is not a cheer. It is a choice. Choose based on record. Choose based on policy. Choose based on how decisions affect your life and the people you love. Leave the team jerseys at home. One day, when your family needs care, you will be glad you did.