anyone else strongly consider leaving due to garbage US healthcare?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For all of you "strongley considering" leaving the US due to healthcare, "democracy dying," etc. please go. Renounce your citzenship and make room for people who want to be here. People are literally dying as they trek thousands of miles to the southern border because they are so desparate to live in the US. Is the US perfect? Absolutely not but it's pretty great comparatively! Your incessant whining and empty threats of leaving is offensive and tone deaf to people who have actual real problems like starvation, being sex trafficed, etc.

This.

They don't need to renounce citizenship btw. Just go and live elsewhere.

99% would be back within 6 months. The average American wouldn't survive a year in Europe much less Asia or Lat Am or Africa.

"The average American wouldn't survive a year in Europe"
Why?

So many reasons. Lack of language skills, ignorance of others' culture and history, sense of entitlement...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op where are you thinking of going?

Singapore, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Germany, UK.....hell, it don't matter if you even have insurance. You can afford to pay out of pocket abroad because it is nowhere near as stupidly expensive as the US.

Have you looked at Canada's wait times? Plus, contrary to popular belief everything is not covered. Yes, you can go to the doctor or hospital and not get a horrendous bill. But you wait to get in, and a lot of peripheral care is not covered unless you have decent private insurance. There's a reason Canadians are willing to go to the U.S. for some things. I know a 20 year old woman who is having multiple seizures per week. She has an 8 - 10 week wait for an MRI. Your sleep study would not be covered, and you would wait.

People love to say this. Do you know people experiencing these so-called long wait times other than your Boomer friends who will complain about anything?

Fact: People over 55 love to complain about how everything is wrong with the world today. My parents love to complain about their health care in Canada. Like how they had to wait 8 months for each of my (obese) father's knee replacements. But the truth was that he lives in Florida for half the year, and still travels for work, so that was literally the only time it worked for his travel schedule. But they are boomers so they complained to everyone who would listen about how long the wait was. Had he just taken the first available appointment, it would have been no more than 3 months wait.

Fast forward a few years and dad finally takes his shortness of breath seriously and gets the doctor to do all the heart tests. Three weeks to an angiogram, and then 3.5 weeks from then until quadruple bypass surgery. He was in the moderate risk pool; had he been higher risk he would have been in surgery within the week.

In short, in my experience the only people complaining about wait times in Canada are old people who complain about anything; just like the maga old people in the US who want government to get out of their medicare.

Yes, friend's 18 yo son needed an MRI for his knee from an acute injury. Wait time was over 8 weeks.

I waited over 6 weeks for my federal job health insurance to approve my MRI.

[Anonymous]

We're in a European country with socialized medicine.

Before we were in the healthcare system, I needed an MRI. I booked it online at the location of my choosing for 4 days later and paid 200 Euros cash for it. Had we been in the healthcare system by then, it would have been mostly covered.

Then I needed to the visit the ER. The bill was 68 Euros.

We have multiple services here that provide house calls - again mostly covered, about 75 Euros if you're not in the system yet.

I can see a general medicine doctor the next day by booking online if I'm flexible on location. I booked my new patient gynecologist appointment about 2 months out - because it wasn't urgent, I was fine with wait.

Prescriptions are mostly covered, but even paying cash usually 10 or less.

The only real drawbacks I've found are long ER waits if your case is not truly urgent and long specialist waits if you want to see only a specific doctor. If you are flexible on who you see, you get in much faster.

Also, I find some medications that are approved in the US are not approved here and doctors tend to be more cautious about prescribing. And our pediatrician doesn't work weekends at all, not even on-call, so we rely on house call services outside business hours. It would be nice to talk to our doctor, but I understand why they don't work after hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should move to Canada. So much better where people are dying while in waiting rooms in ER, due to insanely long wait times.

Riiiiiiiight

As opposed to the US where people are dying because they can't afford insulin.

Neither can a lot of Canadians.

[Anonymous]

Can someone explain where EDs in the US have no wait times? I work in a hospital and we have sometimes ppl waiting two days to be seen. How is that different than Europe?

[Anonymous]

Some of the "garbage" in the US health care system is that people expect too much from health insurance: therapies, sleep studies, going to the ER for sore throats. I really wish our ERs could triage people to urgent care instead of the $$$ ER.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain where EDs in the US have no wait times? I work in a hospital and we have sometimes ppl waiting two days to be seen. How is that different than Europe?

This must be joke?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think getting timely access to specialty care like a sleep study could be really hard in countries with government-provided medical care.

I used to be on a discussion board for people with a medical condition my child has and was really shocked by how long the Brits and especially the Canadians had to wait for appointments with a specialist. Like any specialist, not just a really good one at a prominent clinic who you go to when your local specialist hasn't helped.

I had a medical condition and also came across a lot of UK sites with others dealing with the same illness. It was pretty obvious that I had much easier access to testing and procedures. It almost became hard to converse about it with Brits because they couldn’t even get their heads around that I was dictating the timing of certain procedures. I am very glad I was treated here in the US.

you're comparing apples to oranges. More than likely, the people you were supposedly chatting with in the UK were using NHS. The UK, and other countries, also have private insurance and care. You should compare like for like.

The US is great for healthcare, if you can afford it.

The problem with US healthcare is that everything is freaking expensive. An MRI here costs $2000. In the UK, it costs $800 if you pay privately.

Capitalism at its finest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are very few countries that can provide the standard of care that most Americans are used to receiving.

Amen to that. And I lived in those "super health care" countries. Like Norway and Canada, it is horrible in Canada right now.

Try being the millions of Americans who don't have healthcare. It's pretty horrible.

In the US, the #1 reason for bankruptcy is due to medical reasons - costs and otherwise.

Can you say the same for Canada or Norway?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op where are you thinking of going?

Singapore, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Germany, UK.....hell, it don't matter if you even have insurance. You can afford to pay out of pocket abroad because it is nowhere near as stupidly expensive as the US.

Have you looked at Canada's wait times? Plus, contrary to popular belief everything is not covered. Yes, you can go to the doctor or hospital and not get a horrendous bill. But you wait to get in, and a lot of peripheral care is not covered unless you have decent private insurance. There's a reason Canadians are willing to go to the U.S. for some things. I know a 20 year old woman who is having multiple seizures per week. She has an 8 - 10 week wait for an MRI. Your sleep study would not be covered, and you would wait.

People love to say this. Do you know people experiencing these so-called long wait times other than your Boomer friends who will complain about anything?

Fact: People over 55 love to complain about how everything is wrong with the world today. My parents love to complain about their health care in Canada. Like how they had to wait 8 months for each of my (obese) father's knee replacements. But the truth was that he lives in Florida for half the year, and still travels for work, so that was literally the only time it worked for his travel schedule. But they are boomers so they complained to everyone who would listen about how long the wait was. Had he just taken the first available appointment, it would have been no more than 3 months wait.

Fast forward a few years and dad finally takes his shortness of breath seriously and gets the doctor to do all the heart tests. Three weeks to an angiogram, and then 3.5 weeks from then until quadruple bypass surgery. He was in the moderate risk pool; had he been higher risk he would have been in surgery within the week.

In short, in my experience the only people complaining about wait times in Canada are old people who complain about anything; just like the maga old people in the US who want government to get out of their medicare.

Well, the 20 year old with seizures.

I'm Canadian. I live the wait times, and I'm not a boomer.

8 months for an MRI to rule out MS, before Covid.
A year plus to see a physiatrist because I need new leg braces. Growing kids wait just as long so they go months without braces they can wear, undoing any progress made.
My ds (31) can't even get in to a psychologist even after we offered to pay for it.
Kids needing speech therapy are currently waiting 12 - 18 months.
There are currently no family doctors taking new patients where I live.
Over a year's wait for rotator cuff surgery, the 38 year old waiting can't work.
My best friend waited 6 months to see an audiologist when her hearing aid wasn't working properly. She's deaf.


That's off the top of my head.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think getting timely access to specialty care like a sleep study could be really hard in countries with government-provided medical care.

I used to be on a discussion board for people with a medical condition my child has and was really shocked by how long the Brits and especially the Canadians had to wait for appointments with a specialist. Like any specialist, not just a really good one at a prominent clinic who you go to when your local specialist hasn't helped.

I had a medical condition and also came across a lot of UK sites with others dealing with the same illness. It was pretty obvious that I had much easier access to testing and procedures. It almost became hard to converse about it with Brits because they couldn’t even get their heads around that I was dictating the timing of certain procedures. I am very glad I was treated here in the US.

you're comparing apples to oranges. More than likely, the people you were supposedly chatting with in the UK were using NHS. The UK, and other countries, also have private insurance and care. You should compare like for like.

The US is great for healthcare, if you can afford it.

The problem with US healthcare is that everything is freaking expensive. An MRI here costs $2000. In the UK, it costs $800 if you pay privately.

Capitalism at its finest.

And it is freaking expensive because healthcare is supposed to pay for everything and for everyone, without any triage or evidence-based way to prioritize -- That'd be called fattist or racist or ageist or whatever. Which is why ACA didn't even try to rationalize the already out-of-control costs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Earlier this month, democracy literally died in the US.

So yes, we are planing to move overseas as soon as possible.

Likely to Europe, if we can find any possible way.

Legitimate question - what are you referring to specifically?

You were not aware the MAGAs took over the government after they were sworn in this month?

[Anonymous]

OP, you are pretty far off base. If you have good insurance and can navigate the system it is better here than anywhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op where are you thinking of going?

Singapore, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Germany, UK.....hell, it don't matter if you even have insurance. You can afford to pay out of pocket abroad because it is nowhere near as stupidly expensive as the US.

Bingo! Even if we were willing to spend out of pocket for the sleep study, how much would it be? I think the biggest issue with healthcare isn't the insurance but rather the cost of it. Why can't we make health insurance like auto insurance? You pay out of pocket for routine maintenance, but should something catastrophic happen, you have insurance to back you up. That would involve the cost of healthcare coming down, however, so that people could actually afford it.

Using a sinus infection as an example, it can be $200+ to go to the doctor, have them look in your ears and nose, and ask a couple of questions. For a lot of people, $200 is a ton of money, so they will not have it taken care of in a timely manner. How much would a trip to the doctor in another country be for the exact same diagnosis and medication?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are very few countries that can provide the standard of care that most Americans are used to receiving.

Amen to that. And I lived in those "super health care" countries. Like Norway and Canada, it is horrible in Canada right now.

Try being the millions of Americans who don't have healthcare. It's pretty horrible.

In the US, the #1 reason for bankruptcy is due to medical reasons - costs and otherwise.

Can you say the same for Canada or Norway?

This is such a misleading statistic. Anyone who filed bankruptcy with even a $30 medical bill overdue is considering filing because of medical bills. But in reality that’s not why they went bankrupt.