US vs UK Healthcare
Sep 19th 2004, 10:24 pm
#16
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Joined: Mar 2004
Location: Chicago, Il
Posts: 1,320
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
well, personall I found healthcare in the UK pretty bad. I've had nasal problems for years, nosebleeds, random uncontrollable sneezing, headaches and sometimes fainting. Also had a general energy problem. In the UK I tried probably 5 times to get things seen to, explained to my GP (3 GP's in, 1 in Loughborough, Leics, 1 in Warwick, 1 in Pontefract, West Yorks) each time and all 5 times I was told to improve my lifestyle (for the energy problem) and told that if the nosebleeds get REALLY bad then come back. ALL 5 times I complained that surely there was something wrong?
I went to doctors here 3 weeks ago, I now KNOW that my sinuses are screwed, I am lactose intolerant and have Hypothyroidism. I have pills for the lactose and hypothyriodism and my sinuses are being sorted out. 3 weeks and about 6 visits to the doctors and now I feel fine, my sinus problem is to be looked at more closely but... basically this tells me that either the US is better or I had 3 doctors who were all just not bothered by my relatively simple to fix complaints.
Oh.. and 3 weeks ago was the first time I've EVER had blood taken to find a problem.
So, the US system costs more, Rockgurl doesn't like working there and its supposedly VERY slow BUT.. my experiences don't concur.
Oh.. and I have a VERY good medical insurance paid for by my company. If anyone is negociating with a company for a VISA to come over I'd recommend adding the health insurance into your negociations.
andy
I went to doctors here 3 weeks ago, I now KNOW that my sinuses are screwed, I am lactose intolerant and have Hypothyroidism. I have pills for the lactose and hypothyriodism and my sinuses are being sorted out. 3 weeks and about 6 visits to the doctors and now I feel fine, my sinus problem is to be looked at more closely but... basically this tells me that either the US is better or I had 3 doctors who were all just not bothered by my relatively simple to fix complaints.
Oh.. and 3 weeks ago was the first time I've EVER had blood taken to find a problem.
So, the US system costs more, Rockgurl doesn't like working there and its supposedly VERY slow BUT.. my experiences don't concur.
Oh.. and I have a VERY good medical insurance paid for by my company. If anyone is negociating with a company for a VISA to come over I'd recommend adding the health insurance into your negociations.
andy
Sep 19th 2004, 10:51 pm
#17
BE Site Lead
Joined: Aug 2004
Location: MA, USA
Posts: 92,170
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by sohosid
As a side point, can those of you who don't have work-related heath care give an indication as to roughly how much per month it costs? Coming from a system like the NHS / National insurance, it's slightly worrying that we will have to cough up a significant amount each month...but how much?
Sep 19th 2004, 10:56 pm
#18
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Joined: Aug 2004
Location: MA, USA
Posts: 92,170
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by USBound
Oh.. and I have a VERY good medical insurance paid for by my company. If anyone is negociating with a company for a VISA to come over I'd recommend adding the health insurance into your negociations.
andy
andy
but health care does vary a huge deal depending on where you live, there's no real national standard as far as I can tell, near where my in-laws live, there's a hospital about 20 mins away, but people beg to go to the one 40 mins away because the local is known as the dying home, such a high case of not walking out of it for no real reason.
Sep 19th 2004, 11:04 pm
#19
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Joined: Mar 2004
Location: Chicago, Il
Posts: 1,320
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Bob
That's a must....certainly think of the bonuses a lot more when your over here...
but health care does vary a huge deal depending on where you live, there's no real national standard as far as I can tell, near where my in-laws live, there's a hospital about 20 mins away, but people beg to go to the one 40 mins away because the local is known as the dying home, such a high case of not walking out of it for no real reason.
but health care does vary a huge deal depending on where you live, there's no real national standard as far as I can tell, near where my in-laws live, there's a hospital about 20 mins away, but people beg to go to the one 40 mins away because the local is known as the dying home, such a high case of not walking out of it for no real reason.
Ahh.. I'm in LA and so.. I have like 20 to choose from. Like most Brits.. I chose the closest.
Sep 19th 2004, 11:08 pm
#20
Rock Goddess
Thread Starter
Joined: Jan 2003
Location: Connecticut USA
Posts: 1,429
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by USBound
well, personall I found healthcare in the UK pretty bad. I've had nasal problems for years, nosebleeds, random uncontrollable sneezing, headaches and sometimes fainting. Also had a general energy problem. In the UK I tried probably 5 times to get things seen to, explained to my GP (3 GP's in, 1 in Loughborough, Leics, 1 in Warwick, 1 in Pontefract, West Yorks) each time and all 5 times I was told to improve my lifestyle (for the energy problem) and told that if the nosebleeds get REALLY bad then come back. ALL 5 times I complained that surely there was something wrong?
I went to doctors here 3 weeks ago, I now KNOW that my sinuses are screwed, I am lactose intolerant and have Hypothyroidism. I have pills for the lactose and hypothyriodism and my sinuses are being sorted out. 3 weeks and about 6 visits to the doctors and now I feel fine, my sinus problem is to be looked at more closely but... basically this tells me that either the US is better or I had 3 doctors who were all just not bothered by my relatively simple to fix complaints.
Oh.. and 3 weeks ago was the first time I've EVER had blood taken to find a problem.
So, the US system costs more, Rockgurl doesn't like working there and its supposedly VERY slow BUT.. my experiences don't concur.
Oh.. and I have a VERY good medical insurance paid for by my company. If anyone is negociating with a company for a VISA to come over I'd recommend adding the health insurance into your negociations.
andy
I agree with getting insurance through your company though. Very important.
Sep 20th 2004, 2:07 am
#21
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Joined: Aug 2004
Location: MA, USA
Posts: 92,170
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by USBound
Ahh.. I'm in LA and so.. I have like 20 to choose from. Like most Brits.. I chose the closest.
There's one down the road here, and then another in the next town, but to get to a real half decent hospital, would have to go to either waterville or augusta, which are both 45 mins away, and then the "real" good ones are in portland, about 2.5 hrs away...so not much choice in maine *l*
Sep 20th 2004, 3:09 am
#22
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Joined: Sep 2003
Location: Grand Rapids, MI
Posts: 4,525
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Taffyles
I know the level of care that pregnant females get in UK.
My daughter in law received no after care at all, apart from one doctors appointment about a month after her baby was born...all a far cry from the health visitor and midwife who comes round every day for a while to check on you and the baby in the UK. And the routine tests that are given to the baby in the UK...many children don't get them here.
My daughter in law received no after care at all, apart from one doctors appointment about a month after her baby was born...all a far cry from the health visitor and midwife who comes round every day for a while to check on you and the baby in the UK. And the routine tests that are given to the baby in the UK...many children don't get them here.
I would have much preferred having a midwife and health visitor calling by... luckly my mother, also a RN, was just at the end of the telephone for any questions I had. Oh and another thing my hubby and I have good insurance but the end total for my care and delivery (normal pregnancy normal birth) was well over $2000
Ash
Sep 20th 2004, 4:31 am
#23
BE Site Lead
Joined: Aug 2004
Location: MA, USA
Posts: 92,170
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Ash UK/US
Oh and another thing my hubby and I have good insurance but the end total for my care and delivery (normal pregnancy normal birth) was well over $2000
Sep 20th 2004, 4:33 am
#24
Just Joined
Joined: Sep 2004
Location: Florida
Posts: 16
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Rockgurl
A fellow boardie suggested this thread to me and I thought it was a splendid idea...to explain the differences betweem the UK and US healthcare systems from the inside. There's a lot of ground to cover but I can certainly touch on a few points to get the conversation rolling.
We watch programmes on TV about American hospitals and are duped into believing everything is so advanced that the NHS should aspire to it, but having done the swap, my opinion has changed. The NHS may be struggling financially, but it's heart beats in the right place and its care is second to none. There is an unspoken standard in the NHS that is universally applied across the UK, no matter where you work, and somehow I believed that it would be international but it wasn't. I'm not here to disrespect US hospitals but there are many differences which are hard to accept when you come from a background such as the NHS. I can only speak about the hospitals in which I have worked in the USA, and I know they are not good ones, so maybe one day I'll find one that is of a similar standard to the ones I've worked in in the UK.
I think the biggest shock I had was thinking that American hospitals would be so much better and more modern....but in fact I've found them to be far more backward with old equipment and lack of resources. The single biggest annoyance though, was the division of tasks amoung various disciplines which made care very fragmented. In England I would deal with all the care of the patient...drawing up drugs, making plans with doctors, care of the ventilator etc. In America they assign a different department each of these tasks which means you end up waiting for people or waste time on the phone calling people up when in England I would have just done it and got on with it in half the time. In England I could make changes to ventilator settings and gave all respiratory treatments and took care of the patients airway. Here in the US they have Respiratory Therapists, who do a great job but detract from my job because I no longer have control over that aspect of my patient. I also seemed to have a better grip of what was going on because it was my responsibility back in England. It's easy to forget things when other people are involved.
Another annoyance is that I find American medical professionals to be so far up their own arse (scuse the term) and can be so anal about trivial things. They're really obsessed with bits of paper that take up so much time when you could be caring for the patient. Everything they do is the longest route possible and it's just frustrating. For example, in England if I thought a patient needed a specific drug, I would grab the doctor who was on the unit, explain it, get a prescription right there, take the drug out of the cupboard, mix it up and give it, and then document it. In America, you have to call the doctor on the phone who is not even in the hospital, wait until he calls back (if he does call back), he'll probably say wait until a different doctor comes in. Maybe the next day the message gets through, then you have to order it on the ancient computer system and wait for pharmacy to send it up, blah blah blah. Such a waste of time. In my previous job here instead of one large chart with all my info on it, we had 7 different pages, mostly of repeated information, where nothing flowed nicely and you could not see exactly what was going on. In my last job here, we had computer charting which I assumed was going to be really cool and save time, but no...I was wrong. It was extremely laborious and time wasting, taking up as much as 20 minutes over every hour, and you could not see a continuous flow to help you get a grip on ongoing care.
On TV you see all the state of the art equipment and think it's the Holy Grail over here, but to be honest I've seen better equipment in a deprived Inner London hospital on the NHS. The care in the NHS in my opinion is faultless. and I was one the the biggest complainers back in England. I totally swallow my words and take them all back now. Another thing is that in the NHS you feel safe. It's a job for life, and your opinion counts. If you are concerned about something or think something is unsafe you are within your rights to abstain from that procedure and document why. In America you get disciplined and most likely fired for voicing your opinions. I got into trouble for refusing to give a dangerous drug via an innapropriate route even though I could give evidence as to why it was not safe. In England you are told that if you are trained in a particular way and disagree with something you are right not to do it. It's the opposite here, and it was a nasty shock. Another nurse I know wrote a letter of complaint to the hospital in the US about what she percieved as unsafe practise in her department, and was fired the next day! No explanation! That would never happen in the NHS. It takes a lot to lose your job in England and there are proper procedures to go through.
I've witnessed some serious medical errors in both countries, but the way in which they were dealt with were very different. In the NHS there are procedures to help prevent an error from reoccuring and they promote a no-blame system which means that you can report safely and know that it will be investigated with a view to improving that chance of happening again rather than placing blame. Here in the US I saw somebody die because of an error and though I tried to report it several times there was an element of silence and sweeping things under the carpet to prevent a scandal from damaging "business".
These are just a few things that I have noticed while working over here, and I'm sure it's not the same across the board...only my observations. I hope to find a system with which I am happy and think that maybe as a foreign nurse I was duped into inferior hospital systems. This time I shall be in charge of where I go and can maybe find a hospital worthy of its International reputation. I'm sure some of you have observations as patients at the receiving end of care and I'd be interested to hear your experiences.
We watch programmes on TV about American hospitals and are duped into believing everything is so advanced that the NHS should aspire to it, but having done the swap, my opinion has changed. The NHS may be struggling financially, but it's heart beats in the right place and its care is second to none. There is an unspoken standard in the NHS that is universally applied across the UK, no matter where you work, and somehow I believed that it would be international but it wasn't. I'm not here to disrespect US hospitals but there are many differences which are hard to accept when you come from a background such as the NHS. I can only speak about the hospitals in which I have worked in the USA, and I know they are not good ones, so maybe one day I'll find one that is of a similar standard to the ones I've worked in in the UK.
I think the biggest shock I had was thinking that American hospitals would be so much better and more modern....but in fact I've found them to be far more backward with old equipment and lack of resources. The single biggest annoyance though, was the division of tasks amoung various disciplines which made care very fragmented. In England I would deal with all the care of the patient...drawing up drugs, making plans with doctors, care of the ventilator etc. In America they assign a different department each of these tasks which means you end up waiting for people or waste time on the phone calling people up when in England I would have just done it and got on with it in half the time. In England I could make changes to ventilator settings and gave all respiratory treatments and took care of the patients airway. Here in the US they have Respiratory Therapists, who do a great job but detract from my job because I no longer have control over that aspect of my patient. I also seemed to have a better grip of what was going on because it was my responsibility back in England. It's easy to forget things when other people are involved.
Another annoyance is that I find American medical professionals to be so far up their own arse (scuse the term) and can be so anal about trivial things. They're really obsessed with bits of paper that take up so much time when you could be caring for the patient. Everything they do is the longest route possible and it's just frustrating. For example, in England if I thought a patient needed a specific drug, I would grab the doctor who was on the unit, explain it, get a prescription right there, take the drug out of the cupboard, mix it up and give it, and then document it. In America, you have to call the doctor on the phone who is not even in the hospital, wait until he calls back (if he does call back), he'll probably say wait until a different doctor comes in. Maybe the next day the message gets through, then you have to order it on the ancient computer system and wait for pharmacy to send it up, blah blah blah. Such a waste of time. In my previous job here instead of one large chart with all my info on it, we had 7 different pages, mostly of repeated information, where nothing flowed nicely and you could not see exactly what was going on. In my last job here, we had computer charting which I assumed was going to be really cool and save time, but no...I was wrong. It was extremely laborious and time wasting, taking up as much as 20 minutes over every hour, and you could not see a continuous flow to help you get a grip on ongoing care.
On TV you see all the state of the art equipment and think it's the Holy Grail over here, but to be honest I've seen better equipment in a deprived Inner London hospital on the NHS. The care in the NHS in my opinion is faultless. and I was one the the biggest complainers back in England. I totally swallow my words and take them all back now. Another thing is that in the NHS you feel safe. It's a job for life, and your opinion counts. If you are concerned about something or think something is unsafe you are within your rights to abstain from that procedure and document why. In America you get disciplined and most likely fired for voicing your opinions. I got into trouble for refusing to give a dangerous drug via an innapropriate route even though I could give evidence as to why it was not safe. In England you are told that if you are trained in a particular way and disagree with something you are right not to do it. It's the opposite here, and it was a nasty shock. Another nurse I know wrote a letter of complaint to the hospital in the US about what she percieved as unsafe practise in her department, and was fired the next day! No explanation! That would never happen in the NHS. It takes a lot to lose your job in England and there are proper procedures to go through.
I've witnessed some serious medical errors in both countries, but the way in which they were dealt with were very different. In the NHS there are procedures to help prevent an error from reoccuring and they promote a no-blame system which means that you can report safely and know that it will be investigated with a view to improving that chance of happening again rather than placing blame. Here in the US I saw somebody die because of an error and though I tried to report it several times there was an element of silence and sweeping things under the carpet to prevent a scandal from damaging "business".
These are just a few things that I have noticed while working over here, and I'm sure it's not the same across the board...only my observations. I hope to find a system with which I am happy and think that maybe as a foreign nurse I was duped into inferior hospital systems. This time I shall be in charge of where I go and can maybe find a hospital worthy of its International reputation. I'm sure some of you have observations as patients at the receiving end of care and I'd be interested to hear your experiences.
Hi Rockgurl.
I actually posted a thread on "Nursing" last week asking USA V UK hospital treatment whats the difference?.There were no replies.so,thankyou for the information you have supplied here.
As a Brit who has experienced hospital treatment in Florida I can agree with you 100%.
I had the feeling that they just went overboard on the bill,I experienced some dizzy spells and then fainted [twice]
I was admitted to the hospital where I stayed for 2 days,during which time I underwent lots of tests,[heart related]every result came back negative. I was at the DRS hospital in Sarasota.After the 1st day of testing the Dr said it didnt look good so they had decided to book the operating room at Sarasota memorial for a by-pass operation the next day,needless to say I was preety scared,[I am 41] and at the time was in Florida alone,that evening however a nurse came in to my "private room" and said that I was having another procedure at 6am in the morning,she said that I was having a tube placed in my groin so that the Drs could take a look inside my heart.I told her that I had been booked into Sarasota memorial for a heart by-pass,she said I know nothing about that,but I do need to shave you now,I said ok, if you insist.
At 6am they came for me,it seemed like there were hundreds of them,they took me to the appropriate room where the special equipment was,asked me what music I wanted to listen to[I said I had always been a Beatles fan] the doc said no Beatles what about some Police they'r preety cool,I said ok.
The procedure seemed to last only minutes,but was actually about 1 hr when I heard one of the technicians say to the other,he must be doing something right because I cant see anything wrong.
The main Doc said to me that I could go home in a couple of hours,he couldnt see anything wrong.I actually left in the early evening after some more minor testing in my private room.
The hospital had made an appointment for me see the DR 1 month later and gave me a prescription for blood pressure pills.
About a month later I received the Hospiatl bill.Some of the tests I had carried out were $4,000,$5,000 each,some of the pills were $50-$100 each,the final procedure [catheter] was $9000,the total bill was $29,000 and I continued to receive bills from Drs who I had never heard of,one of which was for $400 from a Dr who said that he came to see me but I was sleeping at the time.
My wife says I am one of the lucky ones,I was spared the by-pass.
Is it true that people all over the country are having life threatening operations when they really dont need it?.
Sep 20th 2004, 5:01 am
#25
Rock Goddess
Thread Starter
Joined: Jan 2003
Location: Connecticut USA
Posts: 1,429
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Sidney
Hi Rockgurl.
I actually posted a thread on "Nursing" last week asking USA V UK hospital treatment whats the difference?.There were no replies.so,thankyou for the information you have supplied here.
As a Brit who has experienced hospital treatment in Florida I can agree with you 100%.
I had the feeling that they just went overboard on the bill,I experienced some dizzy spells and then fainted [twice]
I was admitted to the hospital where I stayed for 2 days,during which time I underwent lots of tests,[heart related]every result came back negative. I was at the DRS hospital in Sarasota.After the 1st day of testing the Dr said it didnt look good so they had decided to book the operating room at Sarasota memorial for a by-pass operation the next day,needless to say I was preety scared,[I am 41] and at the time was in Florida alone,that evening however a nurse came in to my "private room" and said that I was having another procedure at 6am in the morning,she said that I was having a tube placed in my groin so that the Drs could take a look inside my heart.I told her that I had been booked into Sarasota memorial for a heart by-pass,she said I know nothing about that,but I do need to shave you now,I said ok, if you insist.
At 6am they came for me,it seemed like there were hundreds of them,they took me to the appropriate room where the special equipment was,asked me what music I wanted to listen to[I said I had always been a Beatles fan] the doc said no Beatles what about some Police they'r preety cool,I said ok.
The procedure seemed to last only minutes,but was actually about 1 hr when I heard one of the technicians say to the other,he must be doing something right because I cant see anything wrong.
The main Doc said to me that I could go home in a couple of hours,he couldnt see anything wrong.I actually left in the early evening after some more minor testing in my private room.
The hospital had made an appointment for me see the DR 1 month later and gave me a prescription for blood pressure pills.
About a month later I received the Hospiatl bill.Some of the tests I had carried out were $4,000,$5,000 each,some of the pills were $50-$100 each,the final procedure [catheter] was $9000,the total bill was $29,000 and I continued to receive bills from Drs who I had never heard of,one of which was for $400 from a Dr who said that he came to see me but I was sleeping at the time.
My wife says I am one of the lucky ones,I was spared the by-pass.
Is it true that people all over the country are having life threatening operations when they really dont need it?.
I actually posted a thread on "Nursing" last week asking USA V UK hospital treatment whats the difference?.There were no replies.so,thankyou for the information you have supplied here.
As a Brit who has experienced hospital treatment in Florida I can agree with you 100%.
I had the feeling that they just went overboard on the bill,I experienced some dizzy spells and then fainted [twice]
I was admitted to the hospital where I stayed for 2 days,during which time I underwent lots of tests,[heart related]every result came back negative. I was at the DRS hospital in Sarasota.After the 1st day of testing the Dr said it didnt look good so they had decided to book the operating room at Sarasota memorial for a by-pass operation the next day,needless to say I was preety scared,[I am 41] and at the time was in Florida alone,that evening however a nurse came in to my "private room" and said that I was having another procedure at 6am in the morning,she said that I was having a tube placed in my groin so that the Drs could take a look inside my heart.I told her that I had been booked into Sarasota memorial for a heart by-pass,she said I know nothing about that,but I do need to shave you now,I said ok, if you insist.
At 6am they came for me,it seemed like there were hundreds of them,they took me to the appropriate room where the special equipment was,asked me what music I wanted to listen to[I said I had always been a Beatles fan] the doc said no Beatles what about some Police they'r preety cool,I said ok.
The procedure seemed to last only minutes,but was actually about 1 hr when I heard one of the technicians say to the other,he must be doing something right because I cant see anything wrong.
The main Doc said to me that I could go home in a couple of hours,he couldnt see anything wrong.I actually left in the early evening after some more minor testing in my private room.
The hospital had made an appointment for me see the DR 1 month later and gave me a prescription for blood pressure pills.
About a month later I received the Hospiatl bill.Some of the tests I had carried out were $4,000,$5,000 each,some of the pills were $50-$100 each,the final procedure [catheter] was $9000,the total bill was $29,000 and I continued to receive bills from Drs who I had never heard of,one of which was for $400 from a Dr who said that he came to see me but I was sleeping at the time.
My wife says I am one of the lucky ones,I was spared the by-pass.
Is it true that people all over the country are having life threatening operations when they really dont need it?.
Sep 20th 2004, 5:50 am
#26
Forum Regular
Joined: Apr 2003
Location: San Jose, CA
Posts: 148
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Overall, we had a pretty good experience with Karen's second pregnancy and childbirth (first was in UK), but I definitely agree that some things here are just broken:
Cheers,
Pat
- When we arrived at the Labor ward at 3am, contractions about 3 minutes apart, the very first words the nurse spoke were "Do you have your insurance card"
- Baby Alex had to have light therapy ('Billiblanket') for newborn jaundice. Every nurse seemed to have a different idea of the treatment regime, none of which concurred with what the paedriatrician (sp?) said
- Although it was nice having a room to herself, Karen said it was very wierd staying in the ward for two days and never seeing another mum
- I called the medical supply co when we were done with the Billiblanket machine, and they said 'Tomorrow's Saturday - do you really need us to pick it up tomorrow, or would Monday be ok'. Of course, they then tried to charge me two more days rental. Even with the insurance covering 80%, that was $20 a day.
Cheers,
Pat
Sep 20th 2004, 6:53 am
#27
Just Joined
Joined: Sep 2004
Location: Florida
Posts: 16
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Rockgurl
Yikes!!! :scared: $29,000? That's really scary...not to mention the heart problems you've been having. Glad you're ok and that you didn't need bypass surgery, but just the thought of the bill would have given me a heart attack! I think this is the single worst thing about American healthcare...what a worry. If that ever happened to me I think I would get on the next plane to England. It sounds like they can charge what they like. $400 just for glancing at a sleeping patient? It's so wasteful...I bet they even have to pay megabucks to all the admin staff they have to employ just to generate all those bills. Yuck...I hate red tape at the ebst of times but it will take a miracle to sort this system out. Hope you keep well.
Thanks Rockgurl. I had insurance,not know though as it was cancelled a short time later. Best of luck.
Sep 20th 2004, 12:13 pm
#28
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Oct 2003
Location: Central Illinois
Posts: 1,275
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
I had a very different experience when I became very ill in the UK,I went to my GP every day for four days just to keep being given stronger pain killers for my 'migraine',after I'd fainted on the first day!,eventually in the early hours of the 5th day ,the locum sent me into hospital for 'observation',I went into a 2 week coma shortly after being checked in to Frimley Park hospital in Surrey,woke up in the neuro ward of Atkinson Morley hospital in Wimbledon,London,I was there for a month altogether,and was stuck on a 'tilt table' for part of my therapy and had started recovering fast,however,after a month they had to send me back to Frimley Park where they shoved me in a room on my own,the only therapy was when a therapist came in and 'sat on my legs to flatten out my feet to help prevent 'foot drop'!,they said they didn't have a 'tilt table' even though I saw one being wheeled past my open door several times each day,LUCKILY my husband was in the USAF and after even a doctor advised him to get in touch with a nursing home or the USAF doctors,because I would never even be able to sit up by myself again!..at this point we still didn't know what had caused my illness,even though I'd been on a 'spinal tap' the whole time I was in the coma in London,within ten days the USAF had come and put me on a medivac plane to Washington DC,even though I had no valid British passport,or any other paperwork,I spent 6 months in Walter Reed Army Medical Center,I will never be able to thank all the people involved with getting me over here enough,all I needed was intensive physical and occupational therapy,and within 6 months I was strong enough to be released from hospital,I spent another month mostly in a wheelchair,but then got rid of it and used a walker to get around,slowly,at first,but soon I was whizzing around just as fast as I used to before I got sick.....hah! after having all the same tests here in WRAMC,including another MRI,because the UK end 'lost' all my records!,it was discovered that I'd had 'brainstem encephilitis' caused by a viral infection,maybe a mosquito bite,no-one can say for sure what caused it.........the one thing I can say for sure is THANK GOD FOR THE USAF!,and EVERYONE AT WALTER REED!......the cost for my six month stay..... $1000 for 'bed and board'....yes I DO know how lucky I was!!!!!........
.......in 2001 I had an emergency and was whipped into an ambulance and ended up having an angioplasty(the groin cathater),turned out my right coronary artery was torn in three places,hanging by a single thread in one place,they fitted three stents straight away,and I've been fine ever since,no USAF this time,got a bill for $36,663.....as luck would have it ,we've got great health ins.and we just had to pay about $200!...the cause was sleep apnea caused by a possible broken or fractured nose when I fainted onto my tiled floor when I got sick with the encephilitis.......13 years before!
I just hope this never happens to anyone else....but if it does I just hope you'll be as lucky as me!!!!!!.........Sophia (Illinois)
.......in 2001 I had an emergency and was whipped into an ambulance and ended up having an angioplasty(the groin cathater),turned out my right coronary artery was torn in three places,hanging by a single thread in one place,they fitted three stents straight away,and I've been fine ever since,no USAF this time,got a bill for $36,663.....as luck would have it ,we've got great health ins.and we just had to pay about $200!...the cause was sleep apnea caused by a possible broken or fractured nose when I fainted onto my tiled floor when I got sick with the encephilitis.......13 years before!
I just hope this never happens to anyone else....but if it does I just hope you'll be as lucky as me!!!!!!.........Sophia (Illinois)
Sep 20th 2004, 1:32 pm
#29
Concierge
Joined: Apr 2001
Posts: 46,387
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
Originally Posted by Taffyles
I agree totally with Rockgirl on this. I've found in 12 years here that the level of care is far superior in the UK with the good ol NHS. As for waiting lists- well it can take as long here to get treatment- some people have to fight with insurance companies to get permission to have treatment, which can take months. EG my friend who needed a hysterectomy had to get three opinions on her condition before the insurance company finally gave the go ahead to have the op, which caused months of unnecessary suffering. another Brit friend of mine in CA went to a doc in UK while she was home on a visit and was told to see a specialist immediately about a mole on her foot- back in CA she went to her doc she was told it would take 3 months to get seen so she went straight back to Britain, saw a specialist, had biopsy and the mole removed all within two weeks! It was cancer.
My daughter is pregnant and I'm appalled at the level, or rather lack of care, here. She had hyperemesis G and lost 18 lbs in the first 4 months of pregnancy, ended up in ER 3 times for IV because she was dehydrated... and she has not had any of the routine tests that should have been done. The last time we ended up in ER, she was throwing up violently and feeling faint, her eyesight blurred.. we waited 5 hours in the waiting room before she was put in a treatment room and then another hour before a doc arrived and she was put on IV. The treatment room was disgusting- dirty swabs on the floor, layers of dust over the equipment and what looked like dried blood (or could have been coffee) up the walls...yuk. This was Sarasota Memorial, the main Hospital inSarasota, which was voted the number 1 place to live in the US. The next time this happened I took her to the Doctors Hospital- which was a shorter wait 3 hours, and then she was put on a drip, without seeing a doctor, and shoved out in a busy corridor on a trolley for hours...wearing a scanty hospital gown and no sheet even to cover her....but at least the place was clean. I'm more upset about her treatment than she is, because she doesn't know any different- I know the level of care that pregnant females get in UK.
My daughter in law received no after care at all, apart from one doctors appointment about a month after her baby was born...all a far cry from the health visitor and midwife who comes round every day for a while to check on you and the baby in the UK. And the routine tests that are given to the baby in the UK...many children don't get them here.
My daughter in law received no after care at all, apart from one doctors appointment about a month after her baby was born...all a far cry from the health visitor and midwife who comes round every day for a while to check on you and the baby in the UK. And the routine tests that are given to the baby in the UK...many children don't get them here.
I could relate numerous tales of bad treatment here (one of my friends was so irate by the way her 80 yr old mother was treated in Sarasota Memorial that she grabbed a doctor and had him up against the wall by the lapels and told him to do something- the woman had been shunted around on a trolley in corridors for 2 days in severe pain with no treatment), but it would take too much space.
I get fed up with the gripes about the NHS by Brits who really don't know how well off they are- sure there are mistakes and the system is overloaded, but the care IMO is second to none and its free...sure everyone pays NI, but no-one has to worry about how to pay before seeing a doctor and how much treatments cost or whether your insurance company will drop you because you've been diagnosed with a major disease. A Brit couple in Orlando had to go back to UK a few years ago because their daughter was diagnosed with a hole in the heart and they couldn't get insurance for her.
Let's face it, in UK the government has a vested interest in keeping people healthy- the US government has a vested interest in the pharmaceutical companies and medical system making big profits.
Rockgurl, most of the British Nurses who come out to Sarasota end up going back to UK, and a british Doctor who became a friend of mine out here ended up going back to the good old NHS because she couldn't stand the callous system here. A doctor here told me that British nurses are in high demand in the US because they are so well trained...what does that say?
Rockgurl, most of the British Nurses who come out to Sarasota end up going back to UK, and a british Doctor who became a friend of mine out here ended up going back to the good old NHS because she couldn't stand the callous system here. A doctor here told me that British nurses are in high demand in the US because they are so well trained...what does that say?
Rete
Sep 20th 2004, 2:58 pm
#30
Not living a 9 to 5 life
Joined: Jun 2002
Location: North Carolina
Posts: 11,061
Re: US vs UK Healthcare
As an end user of the US health system and fortunately having health insurance, it is certainly very different to what is found in the UK.
For one thing, my American PCP (aka GP) would readily do more tests than perhaps my British GP would do. That's not to say my PCP is hasty in running tests. She and I have a very good relationship and she doesn't do things just to "pad" out her bills.
There's a vicious cycle out there in the American healthcare system. Practioners (especially surgeons) have increasingly expensive liability insurance premiums. They fear or experience being sued for botched treatments or surgery or at the very worse, death of patients. This is possibly one reason why doctors like to run tests at the drop of the hat. They don't want to miss anything just in case the patient later develops a life threatening or long term illness and the patient sues.
However, one thing that's struck me about the American healthcare system is the amount of paperwork generated from a single doctor's visit and the time, the patient's, the insurance company (if appropriate) and the doctor's office spent processing a single claim!
The American healthcare system definitely defines a "them and us" society. Actually, there's probably three categories of heathcare user:
Those who have health insurance and can afford to pay for treatments (even unexpected, emergency treatments)
Those who have health insurance and become financially unstuck by long term or emergency medical treatment
Those who don't have any kind of medical insurance (because they're ineligble through employment or simply can't afford the premiums)
Frankly, I think US healthcare is treated just like a business, with the bottom line being the number one priority. Treatment of patients and affordability of treatment is secondary. This impacts on both the workers and of course the patients themselves.
For one thing, my American PCP (aka GP) would readily do more tests than perhaps my British GP would do. That's not to say my PCP is hasty in running tests. She and I have a very good relationship and she doesn't do things just to "pad" out her bills.
There's a vicious cycle out there in the American healthcare system. Practioners (especially surgeons) have increasingly expensive liability insurance premiums. They fear or experience being sued for botched treatments or surgery or at the very worse, death of patients. This is possibly one reason why doctors like to run tests at the drop of the hat. They don't want to miss anything just in case the patient later develops a life threatening or long term illness and the patient sues.
However, one thing that's struck me about the American healthcare system is the amount of paperwork generated from a single doctor's visit and the time, the patient's, the insurance company (if appropriate) and the doctor's office spent processing a single claim!
The American healthcare system definitely defines a "them and us" society. Actually, there's probably three categories of heathcare user:
Those who have health insurance and can afford to pay for treatments (even unexpected, emergency treatments)
Those who have health insurance and become financially unstuck by long term or emergency medical treatment
Those who don't have any kind of medical insurance (because they're ineligble through employment or simply can't afford the premiums)
Frankly, I think US healthcare is treated just like a business, with the bottom line being the number one priority. Treatment of patients and affordability of treatment is secondary. This impacts on both the workers and of course the patients themselves.