December
2007
It has it’s benefits…and it’s drawbacks.
Being an American that is.
A couple of weeks ago, I was going through immigration at the Edmonton Airport with my mother-in-law and the boys. The immigration agent was very gruff, as he asked how long we were going to be in the States for, until he found out that we were US citizens. He said,”oh, you’re American”, at which point he basically just stamped us through. Even my mother-in-law who is a Canadian Citizen, was stamped through without any questions.
On the flip side, Drew had to have stitches the other day. We had no problems with our insurance (our Canadian supplemental insurance covers us anywhere around the world) at the ER. But when I called my old Dr.’s office to make an appointment to have Drew’s stitches taken out we ran into some trouble. First my mother-in-law called and apparently it was taking me too long to get our card because the nurse told her to have me call them back and then hung up on her! She seemed pleasant enough when I called back but then we ran into the insurance issue. First she couldn’t put our address in the system because it wouldn’t take Canadian addresses (I’m guessing she just didn’t know how to change it). Then she asked me for my insurance info. We both knew it was out of country insurance, so I assumed she wanted it to contact the company. Instead she told me, in not so nice a way, that the office didn’t accept that insurance. No, really? I thought that was a given. The issue was how to get my insurance to cover it. I explained to her that my insurance would cover everything in full and then she got snotty with me and told me I had to call another number to get it approved. It would seem that we have to get approved before they will see Drew. I understand that the office itself probably doesn’t deal with billing and that there is another office to deal with that. But was the attitude really necessary? Last I checked I was still a human being even though I choose to reside outside of this country.
I was once again reminded how good we have it in Alberta…and how messed up the US system is. It’s actually not good enough just to have insurance, you have to have the right insurance. It’s just another way that the wealthy get better care. The better insurance you can afford or the better job you have (which provides better insurance to its employers), the better care you will get.
(Hey Toby and Chloe, let’s talk about this one when I visit!)
So, I’m sorry for your frustrations, but what happened to Drew???? Why did he need stitches?
Interesting. So, you like the health care in Canada? You would be the first person that I personally know that likes it. A small handful that I know talk about how long it takes to be seen, and my aunt (a nursing professor) says that if she didn’t have contacts due to teaching at the hospital it would be horrible, and “no one in their right mind would want to copy the health care system in Canada”, or something like that.
And then there are the “rich” people in Canada who come to the US in order to be seen quicker.
I don’t know a whole lot, and have heard the typical arguments about how the US should switch to a socialized or more socialized system, but it doesn’t seem to make sense to me.
Someone just quoted the percentage rate of income that goes towards health care in some of the European countries, and it was astounding that it could be that high.
Well, one thing to note is that in Canada, while under the federal plan, each province manages it’s own health care and provides most of the funding for it (with some coming from the federal government). Which means that Alberta is going to be different from Ontario which is different from Saskatchewan, etc. Parts of Ontario are bad with long wait times and Dr. shortages (mostly around the Toronto area). But where Mike’s grandparents live in Southern Ontario, they have had no problems. And in Alberta it’s totally different. My wait times to see a Dr. are shorter than they were in Pgh. Wait times to see a specialist have been about on par with Pgh as well. When I was pregnant with the boys I had 9 ultrasounds and never paid a penny. Any time I was concerned about anything with the pregnancy I could walk directly into the hospital, into the maternity ward, and they would see me. They never made me feel like I was wasting their time and didn’t let me go until I felt comfortable that everything was okay. The boys were in the NICU for 4 weeks and we never paid a penny. Sure it has it’s drawbacks at times (but so does the US system). But every time I have had to interact with them, I have only been pleased. It’s frustrating to me that all anyone hears about are the problems in one part of Canada. It’s certainly not reflective of the entire country. Honestly, I’d rather pay for it in taxes before I see it, than have it wheedled out in co-pays, deductibles, and the balance of what my insurance won’t pay. I don’t have to worry about whether a Dr. is covered under my insurance, or a procedure is covered under my insurance. So far the system has worked for us. I honestly know of no one in Canada who has gone to the US to see a Dr (unless they work across the border). But then I guess I don’t know any “rich” people either.
Ah, I hadn’t realized it was a province by province thing – that probably explains at least part of the discrepancy. My data comes from Ontario (southern) and British Columbia (western).
I guess it has always been easy to get good insurance myself (and I am now self-employed – we signed up for the same plan I had when I was working, Highmark (which I just noticed somewhere was ranked the best, or one of the best in the country), just with a higher deductible. I haven’t ever had to particularly think about whether a particular doctor is covered (dentists we have had to think about it, and look around, but we also went to lots of dentists before we found one that we liked) and just go to the appropriate primary care physician or specialist as appropriate.
I am certainly thankful for insurance for all of the costs with Isaac, though I don’t think the hospital should have gotten $20K for two days, and if I had actually had to pay more than the $250 that we did, I suppose I would have been more annoyed.
My parents have some sort of HMO something in New Hampshire, and their provider is known to be one of the worst, and they have trouble finding care and procedures, etc. I suppose that’s one of the benefits of living in a city with the highest doctor-person ratio in the country (or whatever the statistic is), and maybe it will be different if I lived somewhere else.
And by the way, I’d include myself in the definition of rich, and most folks from CMU as well. I just noticed the median salary for Pittsburgh on whitepages.com today, and assuming it is accurate, I make something less than twice the average, and my salary was recently halved when I started working for myself. Hard to imagine the median being that low.