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Exact same experience here!
Anyone promoting American style health care here in Canada has either never experienced that gong show or is independently wealthy enough not to have to think about the costs.
This messages needs to be spread far and wide.
If this visit had cost me less that us$500 I would be shocked. Most likely answer is us$500-$1000.
When my wife had back surgery a few years ago the MRI alone cost us$600, the surgery with all of its various charges was over us$3k. I hope none of you have any idea how horrible it is waiting for a loved one to have surgery AND having to discuss payment/credit options with the staff on top of it. You are not thinking clearly and the numbers mean nothing because you dont have any choice but to agree. Then you feel horrible(r) because you are thinking about money instead of only if they will be OK.
Thank you for sharing, and also
(kidney stone for anyone who is curious. it was horrible)
hope you have a smoother recovery!
smooth sailing once it moved into my bladder. before that the pain was enough to make me vomit.
Would not wish it on anyone. maybe Henry Kissinger but even then only maybe.
I'll gladly take the karmic hit on your behalf and wish it on Kissinger twice. Once going out, then again going back in.
Albertan here. A couple of years back my brother and my dad both died of cancer (an unrelated coincidence) and I had the same experience - there was never a moment of stress about money. There also never felt like there were any untoward delays; when a situation was urgent we were able to jump straight to the surgery/MRI/whatever. There were a few times where we had to wait a few weeks for an appointment, but those were always the low-priority or followup things.
I know a lot of people think of Alberta as "North Texas" and imagine it's an American-style hellscape, but even if it might be a little below the general Canadian standards on some things it's nowhere near. It's important to be aware of the baselines that things are measured relative to.
I recently went in for emergency surgery. Stayed in the hospital for 10 days to recover. On the last day, the doctor came in and said "you'll be discharged today". I packed my stuff and they rolled me out the exit. While waiting for the cab, I thought they have forgotten to give me the bill. I asked the nurse and she said, "there's no bill." It was the best cab ride home ever.
Doctors, nurses and staff at the Grey Nuns Hospital were short staffed but phenomenal, professional and compassionate. Emergency wait was more than 10h due to lack of staff.
Yeah. IIRC the only out-of-pocket costs from my whole experience was the occasional cafeteria food and the parking fees.
Of course, none of this is to say that we shouldn't always strive to be better. There's always room to improve, if only because medical technology itself is steadily improving so we need to keep up with that. But it's good to recognize that the situation's really not all that bad as it is right now.
Yeah. I often wished I lived in toronto.
