I was having a rather good workout on Saturday; that is, until I twisted my knee and felt a very sharp pain. I sat down for a few minutes, then got up by grabbing a window frame and pulling myself up. I limped over to a bench and sat for a while. I was pretty sure I had messed something up really bad. At best, perhaps a bad sprain; at worst, I tore a ligament or tendon.
A Taiwanese friend offered me some “Chinese medicine” which looked like Soy Sauce and smelled like socks that a marathon runner has been wearing for 6 weeks straight. I figured “What the hell?” and rubbed it on, but I knew I needed some ice and maybe some x-rays. Anyway, later that night I went out to eat and it felt OK. The next day, it was still painful and sore and slightly swollen. I began using ice and bought a soft knee brace for compression.
Today, we decided we had better go to the hospital and check it out.
Now, normally I try at all costs to avoid hospitals for several reasons:
1) They aren’t very friendly. It’s full of old and dying people. It’s just not the place I associate with happiness.
2) I don’t trust doctors very much. If you think about it, a long time ago, doctors were experts in looking at the human body, testing it, and finding out what’s wrong with it. They were hands-on. This was a good thing. Nowadays, many doctors know absolutely nothing about health. They understand sickness and disease very well, but they need machines and technology (x-ray, catscan, MRI, EEG, I could go on and on) to even begin to make a dent in what could possibly be wrong with you and go from them. Since I have an inherent distrust of technology (Don’t get me wrong – I love my HTC Touch Pro and my computer, etc…. I LOVE technology… it doesn’t mean I trust it.), I also have an inherent distrust of doctors that rely on technology to do their jobs.
3) In America, I could never afford health insurance, and thus I could never afford to go to the hospital. So, I tried my best not to get hurt and thus end up paying enormous amounts of money for mediocre health care.
In Taiwan, however, most of my fears have been allayed. For one, all people living here (and I mean anybody with a work permit and an ID Card) can get National Health Insurance (NHI) and thus medical care. This is incredibly cheap and effective and it just works.
In America, there has long been a huge debate about the pros and cons of Universal Health Care. For what it’s worth, I am definitely a proponent of Universal Health Care. Just as a small experiment – not scientific or academic in any way – I decided to keep a small record of my visit to the hospital and share it here. Keep in mind that 1 of the biggest arguments AGAINST Universal Health Care is longer wait times, resulting in less actual healthcare, more deaths (this is quite absurd when you think about it), and generally poorer healthcare service.
13:45 – We arrive at the hospital and check in. Everything is in English and Chinese and it’s easy to find our way around. The hospital is packed. Keep in mind, we live in a small town (150,000) in Central Taiwan, but there are people constantly coming and going and the waiting rooms look pretty full (about 2/3rds, I’d say).
13:48 – We get our forms. Chinese only, so Miss Expatriate fills it out. It’s my first time here, so we have a bit of paperwork to do.
13:53 – We finish the paperwork and check in with the receptionist. She prints out a piece of paper which tells us our room number and our queue number. Like Lewis and Clark, we proceeded on…
13:55 – We find the room on the first floor not far away. Not that many people waiting for our room. There are 3 or 4 other doctor’s rooms and there seem to be a lot of people waiting for them. For some reason, our room is listed as “Pediatrics” but also as the place for bone doctors. I guess this is it. We are #15 and the queue sign lists #5 as the current person. We begin waiting.
14:00 – #15 is called (That was fast) and we go in. Jane notices that my doctor is actually the Chief Doctor of the hospital. She tells me this later. He starts in Chinese until I explain that my Chinese isn’t good enough to get by in a hospital and explain symptoms and injuries. He switches to near perfect English.
14:07 – After asking some questions and moving my leg around, bending, etc, he determines it is just a severe sprain and that no X-Rays are necessary. He asks if I want medicine or painkillers and I say no. We walk out.
14:09 – We find out where we need to pay. Another queue here. We are #75 to pay and #60 is currently paying, but there are 6 lines, so this should go pretty quick.
14:14 – Our number is called and we go up. This is a bit of a hassle because the doctor didn’t give us a slip. Normally, Taiwanese people take the medicine the doctor advises and then they have to wait a few extra minutes outside while the nurse prints a receipt for medicine. Since I didn’t want medicine, we just walked away. However, the receptionist seems genuinely confused; she is asking “Why don’t you have any medicine?” I wanted to say, “Because I’m not Taiwanese.” but I figure I had better let Miss Expatriate handle it. She runs back to the doctor’s office to get a receipt.
Later, she explains to me that everyone gets a receipt with some medicine, even if they don’t want medicine. This way, the hospital can ask for more money from the health insurance people. It’s their little way of making a bit of money on the side.
14:20 – The receipt thingie is straighted out and we are done paying. Total cost was NT$290, or about 9 or 10 US dollars (at the time of this writing). If I had taken the medicine, it would have been NT$290 – the exact same price, because NHI would have paid for the medicine. If I had taken X-Rays, it would have been NT$290 (maybe a little more, but definitely less than NT$400 – about 12 or 13 US dollars) because NHI would have paid for the X-Rays.
The cost was broken down as such:
NT$220 (~US$7) – Doctor’s Consultation
NT$22 (~US$0.80) – Taxes
NT$70 (~US$2) – First time registration fee.
So, 9 US dollars and 40 minutes from walking in to walking out and I have the assurance of the Chief Doctor that I only have a sprain. X-Rays, obviously, would have taken longer. During the short time that I did wait, it seemed to be a very fast process. You sit down, wait for your number to come up (obviously, it’s busier over in General Medicine or in other sections of the hospital), spend your time with the doctor, and then pay. Quite a painless and fast process.
So, thus far I have absolutely nothing bad to say about Taiwanese hospitals or NHI. I should note that this was pretty much how it went last year when I fractured my coccyx and I went to the hospital. I had to wait a bit longer then, but it was a crappy hospital. Today, we went to National Taiwan University Hospital – the premier hospital all over Taiwan.
All in all, a good trip. There was also a small 7-11 in the hospital as well as a cafe if we had wanted or needed to stay longer. As it was, I think 9 US dollars and 40 minute was a very fast and cheap visit to get the assurance of the doctor that I don’t need X-Rays or surgery.
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