Healthcare Stories

First, there was 2016's surgery for cancer; then a total hip replacement in spring of 2017. There was no "co-pay," outrageous hospital bills, or other financially distressing charges: just first-rate medical care throughout both procedures: O Canada!

So MANY stories! I moved to Canada almost thirty years ago, married a Canadian. But I live in a border town, work in the US, own property in both countries, pay income tax, property tax, sales tax, etc in both countries. I would not be able to move back to the US side, even though it would make life more practical for me, due to the cost of health insurance. Ontario spends about $3,300 per capita per annum, and I'd be paying that in just a few months in the US! Before the ACA I wasn't able to move back at any cost, as Crohn's and Melanoma are the two likeliest things to kill me. I was a single parent in grad school in Virginia before moving north. Many years later my little girl adopted in Canada was struck with a potentially fatal illness at age five. We could focus just on her recovery, no insurance forms, no co-pays, no deductibles, no pre-existing conditions for the rest of her life. She got better. I shudder to think what would have happened if the same thing had happened to my son in Virginia. On a vacation in Mexico a few years ago, I cut my finger rather badly. Found a clinic, was treated very nicely, given a local anesthetic and antiseptic treatment and four stitches. When I asked where to pay for the treatment, they looked at me astonished. Eventually they figured out how to give me a bill, and I paid it in cash in local currency without damaging my vacation budget. It was eleven dollars. On a vacation and work trip to Thailand, my little girl caught a cold, which proceeded to pneumonia. She was seen by the head pediatrician in the outpatient clinic at the hospital, given blood tests and x-rays, percussion therapy, antibiotics, a follow up visit and more percussion. Total cost: under $200. My mechanic has his own small shop in Canada, his lifelong dream. He employs seven people, mechanics, apprentices, office clerks. It's a sole proprietorship, and I know he takes very little for his own pay out of the company, trying to make it work. If he had to cover his employees' health care premiums he would have to close his shop. This health care fiasco in the US is hindering economic growth. Would-be entrepreneurs with great ideas cannot afford to leave jobs that provide health care coverage, and new entrepreneurs cannot afford to add staff. It's a real drag on the US economy!

Read it and weep USA citizens. My close relative had a headache that wouldn't go away. After a few weeks of trying to figure out what was going on she was diagnosed with a subdural hematoma. The surgery was done by one of the best neurosurgeons on the planet. Mark Bernstein(Toronto). You might want to look him up. This in spite of the fact that as far as neurosurgery goes this was a relatively simple operation. The operation was scheduled VERY soon after diagnosis was made. (reports of wait times are B.S. as serious problems get triaged, and are expedited). The patient was in a great hospital, for about 4-5 days. I hate to think what this whole thing would have cost us in the USA. We however, because we live in a country with a heart, saw NO BILL. Parking cost more than any of the medical work. I am a self employed jazz musician, and I feel for all the great musicians all over the USA who depend on charity to get decent healthcare coverage. Come on USA, grow up, provide your citizens, ALL of them with SINGLE PAYER health insurance. The word socialism has NOTHING to do with this. Stop being so fearful. You are so behind the times. Do something! Made a full #DAresists #Medicare4all

I moved to Canada from Pennsylvania in 2000. My wife is Canadian, and one of the main reasons we decided to live in Canada was the health care system. She was petrified at the horror stories she saw about health care bills. In 2005, I was a permanent resident, not yet a citizen, and I was diagnosed with Leukemia. If you've ever seen the joke about what Breaking Bad in Canada would be like, ("Mr White, you have cancer. Treatment starts next week." End credits.) that was my exact situation. I was diagnosed on a Friday, and chemo started the following Monday. I went through 4 rounds of chemo, spent 28 days inpatient, had numerous ER visits, and went through a course of extremely expensive medication to treat fungal pneumonia. All of this was FREE. The treatment I received was both immediate and impeccable. Without universal health care, I'd be dead, or bankrupt. I certainly wouldn't be able to afford a home, or enjoy the life I fought cancer for.

I married a Canadian, became a landed immigrant at the border and after 3 months had my medical care at a reasonable price. Now that I am older, my income is below the poverty line and dont pay health insurance. My doctors visits are free (more or Less), no hospital expenses except medications and 10 partly paid visits to physiotherapists, registered massage therapist, podiatrist, chiropractor, natuorpathic doctor, each year. For many years, I wanted to go home to the United States., but now I am lucky and blessed to be in Canada, where the health of people is taken care of. Ireta Cowall Fisher

I moved to Canada from Pennsylvania in 2000. My wife is Canadian, and one of the main reasons we decided to live in Canada was the health care system. She was petrified at the horror stories she saw about health care bills. In 2005, I was a permanent resident, not yet a citizen, and I was diagnosed with Leukemia. If you've ever seen the joke about what Breaking Bad in Canada would be like, ("Mr White, you have cancer. Treatment starts next week." End credits.) that was my exact situation. I was diagnosed on a Friday, and chemo started the following Monday. I went through 4 rounds of chemo, spent 28 days inpatient, had numerous ER visits, and went through a course of extremely expensive medication to treat fungal pneumonia. All of this was FREE. The treatment I received was both immediate and impeccable. Without universal health care, I'd be dead, or bankrupt. I certainly wouldn't be able to afford a home, or enjoy the life I fought cancer for.

Actually, because of our "socialized medicine" here, our various contacts with the rehab center (wheelchairs primarily) have been set up for us by our local health complex. Tom and I didn't have to "reach out to them". We have an occupational therapist from this local health care center who communicates also with the ALS clinic at the neurological hospital, which is also fully staffed with an ALS physical therapist, another OT specific to ALS, a respiratory specialist, ALS nurse, nutritionist, psychiatrist, social worker and chaplain. On that communication circuit are also our local Victorian Order of Nurses (NOVA) who come to do foot care and provide trained caregivers (for a minimal cost, part of which is covered by government, but also partly recoverable by tax deductions) from 9:30 to 3:30 every day now. We have a 10,000$ electric wheelchair, custom made for Tom, on loan from that rehab center and all the OT equipment one could possibly need. Our house was remodeled -- doors widened, ramps and elevators added, bathroom made larger for the wheelchair -- all with government grants. We live in Quebec, which is reputedly the best province for health care. Mind you our taxes are substantial, but we pay them with incredible gratitude for this care which is available to EVERY resident citizen. Our NOVA organization also has a monthly group for the primary caregivers (usually spouses) of ALS patients. We are WELL cared for. At times like this, Tom literally cannot reach out. That's the thing with illness.

I'm a US citizen living in Canada since 1983. Since the U.S. evokes God under whom it exists, a confidence that runs deep, I wish to contrast the U.S. and Canada in terms of bottomline... I too am a religious/spiritual person. The bottomline is this...which God does the U.S. of A choose to live under; the God of compassion or the god of mammon. You either reign in the health care industry gorging itself on profits - essentially profits wrapped in body bags or you apply universal compassion that undermines obscene profits where everyone has coverage - it's either one or the other. From what I know, both country's have waiting lines, my US friends like to point fingers...the difference is people up here wait in line to see a doctor, down there people wait to die. I love my country, my heart swells when I hear the anthem, but I am sickened by the lack of backbone of political leaders who continually sell their souls out to the "in god we trust" on a dollar bill. To my country, go the distance to be universally compassionate...

The purpose of Canada’s universal health care system is to provide ALL residents with equal access to quality medical care. I’ve had a few episodes requiring major surgery and had quick access to all the services I needed. The universal system also provides constant ease-of-mind; we know we have the medical coverage we need.

My mother contracted Alzheimer’s in her mid 70s (about 20 years ago) after a fall and a hospital stay that required giving her morphine for the pain. Although she her broken ribs healed, her mind was never the same. Her general forgetfulness turned into otherworldliness. The cost of in-home daycare was prohibitive and after we got home, still wiped us out each night trying to keep up with her. She was still ambulatory, but was out of our control — sort of like a large 3-year old. After a few years of shuffling her back and forth between family homes every six months or so (my brother in Massachusetts, a cousin in Florida and eventually me in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico), It was obvious we couldn't care for her that way any longer. She had worked all her life at low-income wages, had her own home, but couldn't live there any longer alone and her income was only about 600 dollars in social security per month. We looked into rest homes in Massachusetts, where my brother could keep an eye on her, but we couldn't afford them — the minimum cost was about 3,000 U.S. per month. My brother and Icould only come up with about 400-500 dollars per month each from our meager incomes. So we sold her home and she stayed in Mexico, where a rest home run by a well-respected gerontologist could take care of her for less than 14,000 dollars per year, everything included.She got progressively less responsive and finally couldn't recognize her family. Eventually, after almost eight years here in Mexico, even with us chipping in the money ran out, and we looked for other options. Ex-Governor Mitt Romney had run for president and while bad mouthing government-paid health care to appease the Republican base, but had left a fantastic system in place in Massachusetts. So we flew Mom home from Guadalajara (not an easy task) and worked the system for a couple of difficult months with expensive in-home care until we were able to get her into a rest home in Hyannis, were my brother could see her a few times a week and other nearby relatives could check in on her. The state health care system paid for everything and even left my brother with a few dollars each month from what was left from her meager social security so he could get her hair cut, buy her new clothes, some glasses so she could see us, ect. She passed away three years ago at 91 years old.We were thankful that she was well cared for her last three years in her home state and that we weren’t bankrupt in the process. I think that people who work their whole lives and play by the rules shouldn’t be dumped because they weren’t in a high-earning bracket.Most of the people I know make less than their parents did in the 1950s ‘60s and ‘70s, when the U.S. working class had pretty good wages and benefits. My dad, a fellow who never went to college, but is one of the Great Generation, who went to WWII and worked for the federal and state governments, makes more with his various pensions than I can take home with my white-collar job running my own business. That sums up a lot of working folks situations these days. If health care for the working class isn’t a priority for a nation that spends more on health care then any country in the world, then why should national cohesion be expected?How can we be expected to be good citizens when the country takes us for granted? I don’t advocate a socialized economy, but I think what I’ve read and heard about universal health care coverage is part of what makes the United States a great nation. It takes care of its own.I do not think that leaving the half of the nation that can least afford it to fend for itself when the chips are down is part of the American dream, that the Great Generation fought for or part of the legacy they left us. I've lived in Mexico for the past 27 years and see what unequal systems can do to destabilize national cohesion — and this in a fairly homogeneous country. In a country like the U.S. where more than 30 percent of the population are immigrants, only the rule of law and the idea of fairness can keep the country united. Don't let inequality in one of the most basic situations in life —the health of the nation's people — make the country I have been mostly proud to call mine turn into a place where only the rich can survive. Sean Godfrey Former Massachusetts resident Registered Democrat

Aside from the usual and thankfully banal problems of bearing and raising three children, I can report on fairly major issues. NB: I also have a “mutuelle”—a collective non-profit complementary health arrangement that costs approx. €2000 a year and covers the 30% French social security doesn’t pay in some cases. Except in the last, worst item below I don’t remember which paid what. --A hard fall on cement the night before I was supposed to lecture in Oxford resulted in a hip replacement and hospitalisation for almost two weeks [Radcliffe Hospital] plus special transport arrangements home to Paris. French social security and probably the mutuelle reimbursed costs to the Brits. --Three fractured vertebrae and three “vertebroplasties” in which they inject resin cement: cost zero --Worst: in late 1999 my husband was diagnosed with a fairly rare form of cancer : He died a year and a half later after two operations, one very long and risky, intensive care, a whole variety of convalescent measures at home or in hospital, daily nursing visits when at home and, a particular blessing in the circumstances, he was able to spend the last two weeks of his life surrounded by his family at home, in a hospital bed with perfusion and three times daily visits from a nurse as well as regular ones from our family doctor. He could self-administer doses of morphine as needed and we were all with him when he died. Cost for us: Zero, entirely paid by French social security since he had a recognised “serious illness”. I sometimes tell this story now in talks to encourage the French and other Europeans to fight for all our public services, explaining to them we would have had to sell the house if we had lived in the United States. Since I have mentioned giving talks, it may be worth adding that after Smith College junior year abroad where I met and later married my French husband and living in France, I was able to win two higher degrees, a “licence” in philosophy, equivalent to a US master’s degree and allowing Immediate entry to the doctorate. Ten years later I got my PhD with honours in political science from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences sociales, a quite prestigious part of the French university graduate schools system. Cost—about $150/year in today’s dollars for inscription and insurance fees. Comment: Totally impossible for me cost-wise had I lived in the US. With 17 books and innumerable talks, articles and interviews for various social / ecological/ political causes since, mostly without fee, I feel I have “given back”, as Americans like to say. Note: My four grandchildren have now graduated from a variety of excellent, highly recognised schools [except for some at masters’ level with modest tuition fees] in several disciplines and—barring global warming disaster—are set for life. Long live Bernie Sanders!

Dear Julia, I am a US citizen who is living in London because my husband of nearly 14 years is British. A very persuasive argument for convincing me to move back to London was the NHS. We met while I was teaching in France on a Fulbright Exchange and lived in London after marrying, which is how I learned how much better life is with universal healthcare. Although I talked my husband into living in the US with me, we found our health insurance payments were overwhelming--approaching the cost of our mortgage, although the standard of care was not better than the care we received when living in London. We knew how great the NHS is, and appreciated the excellent care we received when my husband was hospitalized for pneumonia for 17 days treatment at Kingston Hospital here in the U.K. As I looked at retirement and the end of my employer sponsored insurance, the cost of and quality of healthcare was daunting, so we returned to London. I have many friends who have expressed envy at my choice. I cannot accept the heartless sacrifice of lives in the USA that is required to fund the profits of the healthcare and insurance industries. My own two daughters from a previous marriage struggled to find any healthcare after they grew too old to be covered by my plan. In their twenties, neither was able to find an employer who offered health insurance or an affordable plan until the ACA was passed. As a result of this healthcare, each daughter was able to receive treatment for problems that had worsened for lack of treatment. I worry about how they will suffer if the Republicans are able to repeal the ACA. When I look at the healthcare available to so many countries, I am distraught that my daughters, and now my grandson, will face lifelong struggles to remain healthy as well as possible bankruptcy and financial ruin just because we are all Americans, born in the richest, most powerful nation on Earth but seen as nothing but consumers. I hope my thoughts on this life-or-death issue are of some assistance in any appeal you can make to our legislators. I have called and emailed my home state's senators to thank them for fighting each of the continual attacks on the ACA, and have contacted through phone calls and postcards other senators to ask them to reject the Cassidy-Graham bill. Kind regards, Debra Daniels

I live in Ireland and have access to low-cost universal universal healthcare. Ireland is a little different as we are on a two-tiered system - public and private - and the public option isn't free (unless you have a medical card) but it is very cheap. If I go to the doctor, it cost me €50. If my doctor refers me to a specialist on the public option, it is free. Same for emergency room. I once had to go to the emergency room and have X-rays - that cost me only €60 total. We also have a prescription scheme here that caps the amount you pay for prescriptions at a certain amount each month. Once you hit that amount, if you need to fill more prescriptions within that month, you don't have to pay for them. This is useful for expensive birth control and other types of medication. I hope this helps! Hilary Gray

I am an American who has been living and working in France since 1991. Even as far back as my first days here I had access to healthcare through my boyfriend's (now husband) policy. Some 20+ years later, following a routine mammogram (some costs covered by National healthcare the remaining costs covered by my private additional insurance) I was diagnosed with an early stage breast cancer. During this frightening time, one thing I never had to worry about was how I was going to pay for treatments. In France, a cancer diagnosis means that your National healthcare coverage goes automatically up to 100% for all treatment related to this diagnosis. Two operations, radiation therapy and a 5 year daily chemotherapy regime have all been covered. My only out-of-pocket expense was a bone density scan, 39€, which my private health care policy reimbursed. I am cancer free now but live with the lingering back of the mind fear that the cancer could come back, but I never have to worry that this "pre-existing" condition will stop me from reaching for and obtaining my professional and personal goals. Since my diagnosis and treatment, I have changed jobs and during a pre-hire medical check-up I was able to freely talk about my medical history without fear that would block me from getting hired....I'm year into my new job and loving it!

Yes we have universal health care here in Ecuador and even the poorest is received at either the public hospital and health care system. In addition there is the Ecuadorian Social Security System (IESS) for those who voluntarily subscribe or those subscribed through their employers. On paper it is great - until you have to use the system! Although there is some level of care for everyone there are serious problems too! There are shortages of doctors, nurses and administrative staff and since there is a parallel system of lucrative private hospitals and doctors operating private clinics, the good, well trained medical and laboratory personnel tend to migrate to these private institutions in the major cities like Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca, leaving smaller and rural areas without good private care nor with decent government operated facilities. So while I applaud a government run health care system providing services for ALL, all the time, without a parallel private system, it needs to be universal, efficient, employing the best medical and administrative people. Will this be possible? Look at the Veterans Administration for an answer to this question! So if we can't run the veteran's administration correctly, how will we do it for the entire nation? So it is not so simple, requires a lot of planning, mammoth resources, a steady supply of well trained medical and administrative personnel and huge outlays for hospitals and related medical infrastructure, unless we simply nationalize existing private facilities and convert them into government institutions. The transition from what we have today to a public system will be a complicated and difficult task. Good luck. Robert Flick

My name is Kate Seley and I was married to a Spanish national who passed away on January 20 2017 - doubly horrible day for me. I have lived in Spain for over 40 years and have 3 adult children who I gave birth to here with the national health care system with a minimum of pain and maximum of joy and supportive care. I want to clarify that in European countries with a National Health Care Service, it is NOT considered "socialized medicine". Conservative PM's or presidents, i.e., Cameron in the UK, Sarkozy in France and Rajoy here in Spain have never thought of repealing and replacing. They may increase copayments a bit as they're more austerity- oriented but that's it. It's too popular and they don't see it as it socialism! The GOP seems unique. To return to my family's and my own experience: In this long period we have all been in national health care hospital, my daughter for a bad case of salmonella over 20 years ago and my younger son for a complicated broken wrist and leg.. I myself have undergone a lumpectomy and a titanium bar implant to repair broken humerus, both with with totally satisfactory results. But perhaps the most dramatic case is my husband's. He eventually passed away but he had 4 different types types of cancer -prostate, bone colon and throat as well as chronic congestive heart failure. They managed to defeat the odds and keep him alive almost 4 years, during which he received excellent and sensitive supporting care. Sometimes, during the final year, I used to think that he preferred staying at the public health hospital to being at home cause he felt more secure there. There are no limited visiting hours anda loved one can sleep there in an armchair that opens up into a bed, rather like 1st class airlines seats.. On some floors, you could actually feel positive vibes.. The cancer facilities and especially the Coronary intensive care unit are very state of the art. The Gps in the local clinics or "ambulatorios" are in general competent and caring and medication has only a relatively small copay.

I want to take some time to talk about usual discussions comparing different healthcare systems: Most comparisons in the US are between the US system and nationalized systems (in Canada, UK, Germany, Australia, Sweden, France...etc); often times such comparisons talk about waiting times of elective procedures. (1) Talking about Elective Procedures is the wrong measure/yardstick! Just because a country has a national healthcare system does not mean it has no private healthcare -- all the countries (Canada, UK, Germany, France..) have private healthcare and citizens can choose to have private in addition to their nationalized systems (talk about CHOICE). (2) Talking about waiting times for procedures (elective or non) is also the wrong yardstick: Waiting times in nationalized systems are related to the amount of funding (or lack thereof) in the system; in the UK, funding cuts in the last several years have led to increased waiting times -- if cuts did not happen (especially in highly populated areas), wait times would not have increased. Same as MN having better bridges if the capital spend had been approved. (3) Competition reduces costs and improves products/services: While competition is good in general, it is better to reserve the competition for more complex/elective needs while offering a universal healthcare for at least the basic health services (level to be defined). This way, one can have the benefits of competition AND have the citizenry access basic healthcare. Current not-for-profit hospitals are not a low cost delivery method of healthcare, certainly not basic care. Not-for-profit hospitals employ large finance teams, issue and refinance bonds almost annually, hoard billions of dollars of cash reserves (2x level of debt) in order to get favorable Moodys and S&P credit ratings so they can issue bonds, therefore hire other finance teams and asset managers and consultants to manage those cash reserves, etc -- in essence everything but "basic and essential care". All these points have something in common -- dialogues in US comparing the systems appear to be all-or-nothing-at-all (black-or-white) while there are several shades of grey (I have heard the number 50 thrown around). It does not need to be only-private or only-national. Let us get our American can-do attitude and solve this elegantly. US systems in general appear to be very complicated (128% of Federal poverty level -- who comes up with numbers and tables like that) and complexity adds costs to any system. Just as the Government is trying to simplify and overhaul our tax system, we should also consider removing complexity from our healthcare system.

When I lived in the US, I had medical care until I was 21 because my parents were working for the US military. After that, I had no medical coverage whatsoever until I managed to get a job with a company that was in an HMO network. Even then, I didn't want to see a doctor because of the co-pay and luckily I never had to go to the emergency room. Now, in the UK, I don't have to worry how much a doctor's visit will cost me. I can feel free to speak to a doctor about a mild pain I've had for years, or for a very bad migraine or illness. No, it's not perfect, but it's far better than what most people in the US have to deal with. Horror stories of people killing themselves because of medical bills don't exist in the UK. Cancer patients and car crash victims don't have huge bills that debilitate them for decades after surviving. Universal healthcare works!

I have a history of very early preterm labor. With an injection from 16 to 36 weeks, that risk of early labor and premature birth is minimized. When I was in the US a few years ago, this drug cost $1,500 per shot (so $30,000, before insurance). It was a big deal for me to find insurance that would cover it, and it involved possibly moving states--in the middle of a high-risk pregnancy. The same drug here in Ireland...I walked out of the pharmacy with all 20 doses for about $80. This drug helped me reach full term for two pregnancies. I hate to think about the parents in the US facing another NICU stay or loss of a child because this drug is prohibitively expensive. (It used to cost $10/dose in the US before the drug company hiked the price a few years ago.)

Last year I tore my ACL skiing in New Zealand while there on a working holiday visa. After a trip to the physio I learned about ACC; a program that provides healthcare coverage to everyone within the boundaries of New Zealand if they are injured in any type of accident. At the time I was 25 and had just lost my American health insurance the month prior when my dad lost his job. So my options were to stay in NZ and have knee surgery done without having to pay anything out of pocket, or return to America for surgery and be in debt thousands of dollars. As a recent graduate I was not too keen on adding medical debt on top of my student loans. I was due to leave New Zealand in 10 days and had no intentions of staying but obviously I had to for the surgery. It took me a while to get over how insane it was that I couldn't return to my OWN COUNTRY to have surgery where I'd have my family to take care of me. Lucky for me I had an incredibly generous group of Kiwis who got me through this difficult situation, both physically and emotionally. -Kaylyn Hobelman