Daejeong, le 3 mars 2021
Stephanie and I have been living on Jeju-do since the summer of 2019. She is now 56 years old and I am 63. We carry small health issues. We have always been very proud to be from a country with a National Health Program accessible to all. Since in Korea, we have dealt with the health system for minor problems. Stephanie had a problem with a hip, I had plantar fasciitis, she fell off her bike. We both had great experiences with Korean health care. Let me tell you about today.
No need to write about what the problem was today except that is was in no way an emergency. I want to share about how it went.
A phone appointment was taken yesterday. We were given this appointment for today at 02:00 PM in a hospital. It is our first time in this hospital so, of course, we do not enter through the right door. After inquiring about where we should go we understand we are not in the right wing of the building. We are then accompanied, outside, all the way to the other end of the hospital and showed the proper door to enter. After having our temperature taken, the nice man at the reception brings us to the fifth floor to the department where Stephanie has her appointment.
It is now 02:05 PM.
Within five minutes we are sitting in front of the doctor in his office and talking about what the problem is and what the potential treatments could be. After making sure we understand his explanations, he says he will need to examine the patient and do blood tests and an ultrasound before he can be sure which treatment would be the best one. Of course, we now expect to have to come back and/or go somewhere else for those. We will surely need at least one another appointment. No, this can all happen immediately, right there on the spot.
The patient, Stephanie, is examined. We are then accompanied to two different rooms on another floor of the hospital for the two tests. Total waiting time, less than ten minutes. Back to the doctor’s office we are told we will have to wait at least 30 minutes for the test results. Less than fifteen minutes later we are called in to see the doctor. He has the results of the blood tests and the ultrasound on a large screen so we may see as he explains the treatment, possible side effects, consequences and the time factor. We decide to go for it. The treatment may start immediately. A prescription is ready and printed. A follow up appointment is taken for one month’s time. We graciously thank everybody, leave the hospital, cross the street to the pharmacy and return to our car, with the medication, ready to go for groceries to take back home.
It is not quite 04:00 PM.
This has been our experience with the South Korean Health system every time we have had to use it. Same for dentistry, same for physiotherapy, same for acupuncture.
I ask you, what is wrong with our health system in North America?
Yep, that’s efficient….in Victoria it would have taken six months to get an appointment with the specialist. Glad you had a good experience–hope you’re both ok?
Alain, I don’t have time to give you a complete answer detailing all that’s wrong w/ our healthcare system in the United States, so I’ll limit my response to a couple things: 1. Our hubris gets in the way of learning from other countries; 2. Here I’ll use a military acronym: Our health care system is FUBAR. Do you know the term? It means “f-ed up beyond all recognition.”
I hope Stephanie has a speedy recovery. I fell off my bike in 2018 and spent a few months in physical therapy.
That sounds like a great experience! So efficient and the patient is on the way to recovery. I used to live in the USA and the Canadian health care system is such an improvement! But I can see now that there is room for even more.
Wow, that sounds delightful, and the matter-of-fact, yet grateful tone with which you wrote your story underscores how simple healthcare could and should be. Without directly referencing all that is wrong here, you showed the alternatives and how they work within a system that is able to repeat this pleasant experience consistently! Definitely something to aspire to!
Amazing things can happen when the red tape is absent from the process.