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Hi all you up der.

I have a question after several TV reports, and the movie Sicko. How is the health care? You see, Mike Moore makes it sound like socialized medicine is the answer, but other reports say the lines for care are long, and people have to wait months to get services, and are told that some important things are elective.

I'd like to hear a few words from the people from this board that live in Canada and see what you all think about your own medical program.

Also, I would accept some comments from UK folks, as you also have a similar plan in your country.

But I know everyone in the media has a angle, and sometimes they are very right winged or left winged. And people in this country base so much on hearsay. I want to know what the real people think.

Thanks!

Our health care was great when the federal Gov't transfered taxes back to the provinces specifically designated for health care, education , infrastucture etc... They made a change many years ago where they now lump all the transfer payments into one sum and let the provinces allocate it as they see fit. Needless to say, health care is suffereing.

Long waits are common but usually emergency cases are zipped right in and dealt with. It's been so long since I had to spend any time in a hospital I couldn't tell you about charges. I do know I pop into my medical clinic, see the doctor, and walk out without having to pay a cent on almost all occasions.

dr_bar wrote:I do know I pop into my medical clinic, see the doctor, and walk out without having to pay a cent on almost all occasions.

Pretty much the same here in Ontari-ari-o. Annual checkups and basic medical services are all covered under OHIP, it's when you get into elective surgery and specialised treatments that things can get expensive if you don't have a good health benefits plan at work. Major surgery (ie: heart transplants) have a long waiting list, but that is more due to lack of donors than inadequate medical care. Mind you, there are other procedures with long wait times, like hernia surgery. That's a one year waiting list in this region, which can be shortened to six months if you opt to pay for it yourself at a private facility.

Having said that, we - like most other provinces - have a severe shortage of doctors and nurses because many of them are seduced south of the border by hefty paycheques offered by major US hospitals. So much for the Hippocratic Oath. If you don't already have a family doctor, you're screwed for finding one. But at least the walk-in clinics and hospital Emergency are always available for the poor and the working class. The rich, of course, have access to much better services.

Got a few hours????

My wife Lana has ovarian cancer. Right now, this instant. She has in fact had cysts and lumps removed twice before, once 5 years ago and again 3 years ago. The last time she had 3 but one ruptured the day before her surgery, almost killing her, and the doctor was pissed at us because he was expecting 3 and only found 2. He figured we should have waited and had another test done (testing is the entire basis of our healthcare system right now) because having him look for the 3rd cyst was 'an uneconomical use of his time. They biopsied the cysts and told us the results were inconclusive. Could be cancerous, could not be, wait and see if they come back. Oh, by the way, you have an extraordinarily high whitecell count so we took out your appendix. Hhhmmm wait a sec, maybe that's where the third cyst went.....

So that was 3 years ago that they cut her open and poked around, leaving her hobbled up and convalescing for 2 months(for the second time), but they got her in and did the surgery reasonably promptly.

This year.... they found the first lump last December. We knew what it was. Her old doctor knew what it was. But our doctor here wasn't sure. She was sure Lana was faking the pain in order to get off work and to get painkiller shots. She said so in plain (heavily accented) English. Lana continued to complain of sever pain, so the doc sent her for some tests. They found the lump again, and it was larger than in the first CT scan. Better get more tests. Since march, we have taken Lana in for 6-8 tests every month until last month. These tests have been done here in Stettler, 80 miles away in Drumheller, 120 miles away in Edmonton, 230 miles away in Calgary, back home in Stettler, 80 miles the other direction in Camrose.... multiple times for each place. They do the same tests in each place, and always find the cysts, and they are always bigger than last time. But they still ain't sure. Let's send you here(pick a hospital) for another test. And on and on and on....

Last July I went with her to an appointment with a new doctor and sat in the exam room for the entire exam. The doctor found the cysts, noticed that she screamed in pain during the pap smear and suggested more tests. I rather calmly but firmly suggested that we all really knew what the problem was. He agreed. He even said he would perform arthroscopic surgery to remove them. But he also said that the pain could be from scarring left over from the previous surgeries, so he may have to open her up to take care of that. He didn't want to waste his time by starting arthroscopic only to have to open her up fully to remove scar tissue, so lets wait and run some more tests. I asked what more tests would tell him. He admitted nothing he didn't know already.

So I, still much more calmly than I was feeling, I talked him into doing the surgery, skipping the little slits and open her up, and FIX THE PROBLEM the right way, the first time. The problem is, the doctors would intimidate Lana into getting more tests, rather than going in and fixing the problem.

Long before this Lana had said she was tired of this and wanted a full hysterectomy. We talked about it and what it entailed, and she still wants it. So that's what the doctor is going to do next week, on the 27th. But I had to make him. Lana tried to talk him into it, but he wouldn't until I started in on him. From the day he decided to do the surgery until the day of it, it will have been just under 3 months. And they tell us at every opportunity how quickly they are getting her in.

Lana has been off work since late March. About 3-4 times a week I come home from work and find her passed out on the floor, or doubled over in pain crying in bed. So I carry her to the car and drive her 25 miles into Stettler for a shot. There is no doctor in duty after noon, they have to call one in to give it to her. It is usually about 3 hours before one comes in, but it has been as long as 8 hours. And then I load her back up and drive home. If I'm lucky, I grab a few hours sleep before going back to work for another 12 hours. Am I getting cranky? No, not much, I'm not......

Lana is fed up with feeling sick all the time (she can only eat a few mouthfuls at a time or she pukes it back up) and being in constant, sever pain. I am tired of finding my wife on the ground crying in pain, and hearing her dry heave while I make and eat my supper. And both of us have had it with spending every few nights sitting in Emergency, waiting for a doctor to show up and jab some less effective derivative of demerol into her and send us home. Sitting in the same hospital that Lana works as an LPN in......

Our healthcare system has degenerated into an endless round of getting passed from one test to another, just so that each doctor down the line can bill out another test and another visit. They have ZERO interest in curing anyone. A month ago one doctor called and told us that a biopsy she took 2 months ago came back showing positive for cancer. She wanted more tests. We told her she could talk to the surgeon after he removed the cause and test that. She tried to talk Lana out of the surgery and get MORE tests done. I told her no, but not that politely. So now the fight is on to get chemo or some such after surgery cancer treatment....

Years ago, our healthcare system was great. Lots of doctors, lots of high quality treatment, very little wait. The past few years have seen that flushed down the crapper. Now it's all about getting visits and tests done by as many doctors as possible, so that they can all send the government a bill. Since no one gets better, these visits and tests keep going on and on until the patient dies, but the doctors have gotten multiple billable hours out of them by then and are ready for the next invoice to stagger in the door. We need to make doctors accountable again, go back to the way we did it a decade ago, and stop trying to Americanize our system. Right now, I would much rather be treated in the US than here. That's where all our native doctors are, the ones we have here now are all from South Africa (if you get a good one) or from some backwater village in India or Continental Africa. Call me whatever you like, I firmly believe that I should be able to understand what my doctor is saying without a translator. Right now, it's been about 5 years since I could do that.

Neither your nor our system is very good right now, but I would rather have your's at this point.

Dean, I can sympathize with you. Laura has been waiting almost a year to get her Hysterectomy done, but it's finally going to be taken care of on October 2nd. Several times over the last year, she has hemorraged (sp?) for up to three weeks, and the doctors tell her that there is nothing that they can do, because it isn't 'life threatening'. The pain of her cramps leaves her immobilized, nauseous, and unable to function like a normal human being.

The only reason it is finally being done now is because the hospital here in Red Deer decided it was time to clear up some of her doctor's surgery wait list.

three months is lightning quick for Lana, and I wish her a speedy recovery. Where is she having it done? Red Deer? Stettler?

Lana's surgery will be in Camrose. And I am pretty sure the reason she is getting it now is that I was there and asked why more tests were needed when everybody involved knew what the problem (and solution) was. And the fact that this is her third go around with this and it was diagnosed in March.

Seems the only way to get anything done is to beat the medical establishment with a logic stick. And swing that sucker hard and fast.

It is totally up to the doctor if and when anything will be done. Lana has a cousin with the same condition but her doctor refuses to do a hysterectomy on the grounds that at 45, she is too young. She might want more kids. The 2 she has now are in high school and collage, but Dr. Dick feels he has the right to make her live with this pain on the grounds that he thinks she may want another one.... so she can lean on the stroller when she goes to collect her pension, I guess.

How many miles have you guys racked up this year going from test to test? We've got a few thousand klicks so far....

While Canada does have Universal Health Care and is funded in large part by Federal funds, its the mandate of the Provinces to administer and allot funding to their individual Provincial Health Care systems, so it is no to unusual to see great differences between service level between the Provinces.

When I got T-Boned off my bike back in '93, I was promptly treated. Paramedics arrived and stabilized my shattered leg and ensured I wasn't bleeding to death on the city streets.

At the hospital, I was given pain killers, assessed, further stabilized and x-rayed. Later that evening, I was in the O.R. and my leg was put back together. After which came months of intense rehab, where I relearned to walk and further operations to remove the hardware from my leg. All this paid for by BC Medical Insurance, of which is not free, contrary to popular belief South of the border, I paid paid monthly premiums.

The thing is, while Canada's Universal Health Care system is in trouble, it is still head and shoulder over what many millions of our American cousin's have. True there are waiting lists for treatments of some non-life threatening procedures or for various elective procedures. But if you need immediate life saving procedures, it is there for you and you will not go bankrupt accessing it.

Plus, there is no private Health Insurance Company run HMO telling you what you can or cannot or rather what is or is not covered by your insurance.

Anyways, I though this was a Motorcycle forum, not a Political one.

If anyone wants, I can direct you to a couple Political boards

No miles wracked up going for tests, fortunately. Her doctor knows what is wrong with her, but because her condition is not life threatening, he is hampered by the lack of surgery time for elective processes. Laura is already unable to have more children due to previous procedures, so that is not an excuse for not doing the surgery - simple fact of the matter is that here in Red Deer, the hospital won't book in elective surgery on short notice - if it's not life threatening, then you get to wait until they clear up space and time, regardless of how much pain you are in or how it affects your life.

Jeeze, I missed this one....

the healthcare system is good in that you dont really have to pay to get basic treatment, but unless you live in a major center, youre traveling for things like...ohhh...cancer treatment.... in northern ontario, its not uncommon for people to have to travel hundreds of kilometers just to get chemo.

doctor shortages suck too. they dont seem to want to be in northernontario,. I havent had a familky doctor in years, but one of the perks offered by the company I now work for was them dangling the posibility of a family doctor.

NorthernPete wrote:Jeeze, I missed this one....

the healthcare system is good in that you dont really have to pay to get basic treatment, but unless you live in a major center, youre traveling for things like...ohhh...cancer treatment.... in northern ontario, its not uncommon for people to have to travel hundreds of kilometers just to get chemo.

doctor shortages suck too. they dont seem to want to be in northernontario,. I havent had a familky doctor in years, but one of the perks offered by the company I now work for was them dangling the posibility of a family doctor.

Sad thing is, there are hundred of qualified, trained, skilled and experienced doctors in Canada who would love to practice their art, however since they are foreign trained, they end up behind the wheel of cab. Same hold true for qualified RN's, thousands of them can only get menial jobs as cleaners at our hospitals, because again, they trained and qualified overseas.

And it is not just Doctors and Nurses who trained in nations such as India. My mother was a qualified and experience OR nursing sister in the UK, when we came to Canada, she could not get a job as a nurse because the BC Nurses governing board refused to recognize her qualifications. Many years later she did go back to school to re-qualify, and more often then not ended up assisting or correcting many of her instructors.

Sadly its not just the medical professional bodies that reject foreign trained professionals. I was seeing a lady from China once who was not only a highly trained and skilled Electrical Engineer, but one who designed power grids, taught in a university and wrote a number of training manuals and textbooks. The Government of Canada fast tracked her immigration here because we need people with her background and skills, but the BC Society of Electrical Engineers told her no, you are not qualified, we do not recognize your certification, education or experience.

Bloody stupid if you ask me. People like myself and NorthernPete do not have access to a family doctor because the ones that are available are swamped, or have been lured south of the border by big bucks. And yet hundreds of doctors who could fill this huge need and who would go into the northern parts of our nation sit idle or are driving cabs.