this post was submitted on 10 Dec 2023
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I have no reason to mock american healthcare. Sure, here in Belgium I can afford to see a doctor, but I don't know if I can find one.
My previous doctor retired and all the other doctors in the area have a patient stop. They will only give you an appointment if you already are a known patient. I can only hope one of them is willing to take me the next time I'm sick.
My dentist has so much work he doesn't answer his phone and doesn't has an online method to make appointments. You have to plan your next appointment when you visit him and his agenda is usually booked for the next 6 months.
Sounds close to what we have in the Czech Republic. And they even say that the doctors who came from Ukraine are "not worthy" to work here without a few years of reeducation.
Odd that your old doctor didn’t have a plan to distribute patients to new doctors when they retired.
At least my doctor notified his patients that he was going to retired. I have a collegue who found out his doctor retired when he got ill.
My wife's doctor left the state hospital a few months ago. We didn't find out until her prescription wasn't sent to the pharmacy. Had to call the hospital to find out. They didn't distribute the doctors patients, and they didnt even call in the prescriptions that only required a yearly check.
That's the most tame story I have about that hospital and it's the most luxurious hospital I've ever seen. It looks like a 4 star hotel. I considered suing them at one point but a family lawyer told me it would be too hard to prove fault, even though they were clearly at fault.
They're retiring, they ain't got time for that. My dentist did the same.
Not trying to downplay your plight at all, but in America this is also the case. Not only are doctors visits expensive to an extremely outrageous extent, but you might not be able to find one that can take you.
Waitlists for medical, dental, psychiatric etc doctors in my area are a minimum of 3 months long.
A few years ago I called the largest network of therapists in my area for an appointment. They told me I would be on a wait list and I probably wouldn't hear back for 6 weeks. I got a call 6 months later.
Medical doctors and dentists are even worse. No wait lists at all. Emergency clinics full of low quality doctors and practitioners are popping up everywhere because most people don't go to the doctors enough to still be an active patient. They don't go enough to be seen because they can't afford to go unless they are truly terribly sick. Those clinics charge far more, do far less, and care the minimal amount about patients.
A quick look in your ear? $150. You have a real problem? Well, they will charge you the $150 and then tell you to go to the hospital.
I have never heard of anyone in my area getting a dentist appointment in less than 3 months. To even get patient status takes a friend knowing that their doctor is taking new patients. And the chances are that if you can't afford a doctor, your friends can't either.
Damn, that sounds like it really sucks. Any idea why there aren't enough doctors there?
Probably the same problem as most health care systems. Regular “general practitioner” doctors like family doctors or what we might call primary care physicians in the US are very much overworked and underpaid.
If you want to make money as a doc, you need to be a specialist at the very least.
I have a family member who is a GP and they said they wouldn’t recommend anyone become a regular doc. Too much work, too much paperwork, difficult schooling, and now nurse practitioners, DOs, and others can write scripts, the GP’s skillset is being undermined and their pay cut as clinics just use nurses to see patients instead of doctors. That’s the US anyway, but I imagine other modern countries’ doctors face too much work and too little monetary incentive to encourage others to want the job.
Sometimes it's also stupid competitive exams that excessively reduce the number of medicine students.
I think it's mainly because there is a limitation of the amount of students who can start the education. Every year the government holds entry exams and only the best 1600 can start the studies. Somewhere in their studies they have to choose their specialisation (heart, children, oncology,...) And as far as I know only a small part of them is interested to become a 'housedoctor' ( the type of doctor we have to visit when we have something like a flu)
Yeah, it's terrible here. My doctor needs you to make an appointment, which is usually full for days (sometimes even weeks),... Last time I had something urgent I just went to random other one and explained mine was booked full... He took me, but he didn't even come near me. 😅 It seemed that one had become a bit germophobic since Covid. Was weird to see a doctor act that way. 😅