Non-Americans, what's it like when you're sick and need to go to the doctor?
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United Kingdom, Dorset.
My 3 year old daughter was vomiting and not keeping liquids down. Phoned the non-emergency line and after a bit of a wait, spoke to them and went through the script.
Was told to go to A&E and we would be expected. After a short wait there, was led down to the children's ward and she was given a bed in her own room. She was put on a drip, had antibiotics and kept in overnight. By the end of the following day she was able to keep down water and some toast so was discharged.
Had a follow on call from a GP the next day, she was back to normal in a couple of days.
Cost: £0 (I contribute to the NHS through general taxation)
This has been pretty much our experience too when our kids have been ill, except they didn't have their own room but a small ward.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
Honestly depends.
If it's life or death urgent, an ambulance arrives, takes you away and with any luck, fix you right up. Visitors will likely have to pay to park at the hospital, and that will be your biggest expense. When my dad had a cardiac arrest, it was during covid, so the parking was free. The biggest expense was cleaning his blood off the carpets and putting their cat in the cattery for a week.
If it's something non-urgent, and the cause isn't immediately found by a doctor, then you might go on a waiting list and be seen in a few months maybe. And even then it might not get sorted. It's not like House.
The most annoying bit is the 8am phone roulette to try and get an appointment.
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That sounds kind of scary, did they actually get to the bottom of what happened or was it just "Hey, she can eat toast now, you're free to go!"
Yes it was gastroenteritis, luckily she bounced back quite quickly!
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This has been pretty much our experience too when our kids have been ill, except they didn't have their own room but a small ward.
Yes I think we got lucky with the room, perhaps it was just a quiet period
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Honestly depends.
If it's life or death urgent, an ambulance arrives, takes you away and with any luck, fix you right up. Visitors will likely have to pay to park at the hospital, and that will be your biggest expense. When my dad had a cardiac arrest, it was during covid, so the parking was free. The biggest expense was cleaning his blood off the carpets and putting their cat in the cattery for a week.
If it's something non-urgent, and the cause isn't immediately found by a doctor, then you might go on a waiting list and be seen in a few months maybe. And even then it might not get sorted. It's not like House.
The most annoying bit is the 8am phone roulette to try and get an appointment.
If he had a bat would you put it in a battery?
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We do also get money taken directly out of our pay check for health insurance. So it isn't just the 5 euro fee. But I think it manages to be considerably less, since everyone is required to have insurance. I think that brings down the cost for everyone.
This is what absolutely kills me about the people around me in this country....
The owner of a company has an idea of your total value, your "compensation." They factor in the cost of healthcare in that calculation, so we're still paying for the insurance and yet so many people see it as "their company pays for it, if we had universal healthcare then I would have to pay a tax!" ... mother fucker you already pay the "tax" for a much worse, more expensive system where people still aren't covered...
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United Kingdom, Dorset.
My 3 year old daughter was vomiting and not keeping liquids down. Phoned the non-emergency line and after a bit of a wait, spoke to them and went through the script.
Was told to go to A&E and we would be expected. After a short wait there, was led down to the children's ward and she was given a bed in her own room. She was put on a drip, had antibiotics and kept in overnight. By the end of the following day she was able to keep down water and some toast so was discharged.
Had a follow on call from a GP the next day, she was back to normal in a couple of days.
Cost: £0 (I contribute to the NHS through general taxation)
Overnight stay at a hospital here in the US is at least $3,000 / £2.196 / €2.552
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
wrote last edited by [email protected]Portugal
If it doesn't require immediate attention I call my health center. I can get an appointment with my family pshysician in a few days or, if it's more urgent, some other doctor will see me the same day but I'll have to wait there until one is free (can go anywhere between 15mn and 2 hours). I'm lucky though, some health centers suck really bad. The ones in big cities are generally better.
If it's more urgent I call the national health line and they'll A: tell me how to treat it myself B: set up an appointment in my health center (or another if mine is not available)
send me straight to the closest emergency room.Wait times in the emergency room depend on the gravity and the hospital. My hospital sucks. Low priority you'll spend there the whole day, easy. 10+ hours. Medium priority you'll wait 4 or 5 hours. High priority about an hour, maybe two. Very high priority (head falling off) you go right in. In good hospitals those times are much lower. In the major city I used to live I never waited more than 2 hours for any priority. I also had surgery there and it was great.
Never paid a cent, I think it goes without saying.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
Canada. It's generally easy and free (no direct cost to me). I try to avoid having to go to my doctor whenever possible and I live with a nurse (and my doc knows that). Usually when I send him a message, either by email or by calling, he'll have a follow up question or two (sometimes none) then decide a course of action and move right to implementation. Sometimes that's sending a script to my local pharmacy, sometimes that's a referral to a specialist. Who knows? I haven't seen the guy in years. But if he made the request for me to go in, I would without hesitation.
I know my experience isn't the same as others, since my doctor and my spouse have actually worked together; but still. It's all free and there's usually minimal waiting.
The only significant delays I've heard of in Canadian healthcare relate to major procedures when the issue is non-critical. Like getting an MRI as a precaution, to make sure things aren't messed up or something (IDK what MRIs are used to diagnose, I am not a doctor).
Everything is triaged, so if you're not actively dying from a thing, and you need a big piece of equipment to scan you to figure something out, you're going to be waiting a while.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
The Netherlands
I call my doctor, make an appointment the same day, go there, tell my story, get referred to a specialist or get meds or whatever, all covered by insurance.
Specialist: sometimes appointment within a week or 2, sometimes it takes a month. It's covered by insurance, but there's an own risk budget each year of 380 euros. So all costs up to that budget are paid by yourself, the rest is covered. But since I'm getting mental health care, I pay 380 each januari and the rest for the entire year is all covered. This year I've had a broken collarbone repaired with a metal plate with all the photos before and after, I had 2 bladder infections which needed antibiotics and I had food poisoning on holiday and intestand infection, which was all covered at home and abroad.
Insurance
I pay 180 a month. It includes dental and some extras like 9 physical therapist appointments.
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Yes it was gastroenteritis, luckily she bounced back quite quickly!
Wow! I had no idea that was even possible for a 3 year old! Glad she's OK!
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UK here. This is all "free" (i.e. paid for by a significant portion of every paycheck I ever earn via tax).
I phone my GP. They say you have I call at 0830 to get an appointment. Call back tomorrow. I ask for an advance appointment and they say they have nothing for 6+ weeks. So I call back the next day and the line is constantly busy. I get through at 0837 after mashing redial constantly. I'm told the appointments are all gone and I should call back tomorrow again. They suggest "if it's urgent then go to the A&E department"....which is clearly inappropriate for my problem. So I call back the next day. The next day I happen to get through at 0833 and they take my details. I'm told the doctor will call me back at some point later that day. Spend the day watching the phone, but can't answer it because I'm work. Duck out of something really important at work to take the call, I'm told to come to the GP later in the day. Later in the day I have work stuff I can't just leave immediately, so I ask for an appointment the next day. Get told to phone back at 0830 the next day to make an appointment.
I've figured out a way to short circuit the system. There's a national urgent medical line (111) and I have to answer the operator's questions for 20 min (am I bleeding profusely? Am I unable to breathe? Am I going to die imminently?). Finally, they're able to allocate an appointment for my own GP at a sensible time the next day.....apparently thesr guys have access to appointments with my GP which the fucking GP won't give me. Great! I go to the GP to be seen by a FY2 doctor (i.e. 15 months posts undergraduate qualification), this guy admits that he doesn't know what he's doing, that he'll speak to the GP later and phone me back with the outcome later that day. He phones me back later that day saying they don't know what to do so they're going to refer me to a hospital specialist, the hospital appointment should be sent to me in 10 months or so.
The few times I have had to go to the A&E department with my kid, I've taken chargers, entertainment devices, extra coat for my kid to use as a blanket, food (2 full packed meals), water, video game console.......I'm expecting to be there for about 6 hours if things move really quickly.
The state of national healthcare in this country. Thank you Conservatives, for 13 years of record low investment.
wrote last edited by [email protected]111 isn't an urgent line (if it's genuinely an emergency go to A&E or call 999) and from personal experience it takes hours for them to get back to you, at which point you've either already told them your symptoms have got worse, still had no call back and gone to A&E or they get back to you eventually and tell you that you might be fine, but should go to the hospital anyway and sit in a queue for 6 hours so they can make sure it's not actually something serious. NHS 111 is just as useless as the NHS Direct it replaced
For GP appointments that are released on the day, in the morning, you can avoid waiting in a long call queue to the GP by booking the appointment through the NHS app if your GP supports it.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
UK. Phone local GP, no appointments available for ~3 weeks, maybe get a call back appointment in 2 weeks if I'm lucky. Alternative is to phone every morning between 0830-0900 and either not get through or be told there are still no appointments available.
I have found walk in pharmacists to be well educated (better than many GPs?!) and available without appointment so they're usually my first port of call.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
wrote last edited by [email protected]Brazil, urban area, with a health plan (private healthcare)
I go to the doctor, grab a little paper with a number on it, wait for the number to be displayed on the monitor, go to the reception desk, give them my health plan card and my ID, they give those back to me, I sit back down and wait for the same number to be displayed on a different monitor. Once it's displayed, I go to the room number shown on the monitor and from there, I discuss what problem I have with an adequate specialist.
For an unplanned visit, the wait time is usually 5–30 minutes, depending on the hour and season (there are a lot of tourists during summer, meaning longer wait times and more people at the hospital).
I don't know about pricing (my parents pay for it), but it's probably not too expensive since we've never had financial problems due to health issues (as far as I'm aware).
I've never not went to the doctor for financial reasons, only for health concerns (worrying about getting sick with something else, specially if the waiting room is full or almost full). Sometimes prescribed medicine can be pretty expensive.
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111 isn't an urgent line (if it's genuinely an emergency go to A&E or call 999) and from personal experience it takes hours for them to get back to you, at which point you've either already told them your symptoms have got worse, still had no call back and gone to A&E or they get back to you eventually and tell you that you might be fine, but should go to the hospital anyway and sit in a queue for 6 hours so they can make sure it's not actually something serious. NHS 111 is just as useless as the NHS Direct it replaced
For GP appointments that are released on the day, in the morning, you can avoid waiting in a long call queue to the GP by booking the appointment through the NHS app if your GP supports it.
Very much this.
If you live in the UK download the fucking app.
If all the ppl. bitching about the phone lines just used the app. then the ppl that actually HAVE to use the phone lines (digitally excluded ppl) wouldn't have so long to wait \ phone back every day.
Every time I've needed to contact the gp for something I've done it through the app and then I've either been contacted back with advice \ an appt or an onward referral within 24 hours.
If you need help quicker than 24 hours it's an emergency, if you think it's an emergency but don't want to go to a and e it's not a fucking emergency.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
Norway, I book online if it's not urgent and wait a few weeks. If it's urgent I call them and get it same day. Costs about ~250 NOK or ~20 USD I think.
Public doctors are always at least 45 minutes late (unless you are late if course, then they call you on time)I also had a non-urgent matter, but felt like wait time was too long (holiday season) so I went to a private clinic, got appointment same day and paid about 700 NOK I think.
I go there, tell my story, if they need to take some samples they can usually do them on site right away for no additional charge.
If I need some medicine they prescribe that and tell me to come back in x weeks if it's not getting better.
If they can't help me I get a referral. It could take a long time to get certain procedures, especially if they are not urgent/very important, but most of the time it's been a few weeks for my issues.
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Which country are you in and what's a typical doctor visit like? How much? Wait time? Etc
Brazil:
Call an Uber, go to the hospital, grab a ticket, pass thru triage, called by name, show my id, triage decide which specialist to see, go to specialist waiting room and wait to be called by name.
Doctor examines me, ask for exams, maybe prescribe medication, do the exams, wait for result.
Back to doctor, prescribe medication, hospital provides medication (unless is something very uncommon, if so go to the pharmacy and buy it).
Call Uber, go home.
Total cost: Uber fare, usually about 6 dollars total.
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Brazil:
Call an Uber, go to the hospital, grab a ticket, pass thru triage, called by name, show my id, triage decide which specialist to see, go to specialist waiting room and wait to be called by name.
Doctor examines me, ask for exams, maybe prescribe medication, do the exams, wait for result.
Back to doctor, prescribe medication, hospital provides medication (unless is something very uncommon, if so go to the pharmacy and buy it).
Call Uber, go home.
Total cost: Uber fare, usually about 6 dollars total.
No need to call in advance and book.
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Brazil:
Call an Uber, go to the hospital, grab a ticket, pass thru triage, called by name, show my id, triage decide which specialist to see, go to specialist waiting room and wait to be called by name.
Doctor examines me, ask for exams, maybe prescribe medication, do the exams, wait for result.
Back to doctor, prescribe medication, hospital provides medication (unless is something very uncommon, if so go to the pharmacy and buy it).
Call Uber, go home.
Total cost: Uber fare, usually about 6 dollars total.
Insurance is about 180 reais for two people, or about 30 dollars per month.
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UK. Phone local GP, no appointments available for ~3 weeks, maybe get a call back appointment in 2 weeks if I'm lucky. Alternative is to phone every morning between 0830-0900 and either not get through or be told there are still no appointments available.
I have found walk in pharmacists to be well educated (better than many GPs?!) and available without appointment so they're usually my first port of call.
Wow you get to phone yours? We get an awful convoluted website where you have to type in all your details every time, including pointing on a diagram of a person where it hurts and explaining the problem. It takes forever to fill out and you submit it and then wait however long they want to triage you. Tbf if it's fairly urgent they are fairly quick but it's the worst experience when you're sick.
Then maybe you get a phone call with a doctor who basically just tells you to wait and maybe they prescribe something which then the local pharmacy won't have in stock. Contact your doctor again to get it changed to something else? Good luck! Many days later you get your prescription after you finish needing it.
