I thought I would post an updated rerun of something I posted this summer of my experience as a tourist this summer on a cruise ship, being forced to leave the ship in Italy for medical care.
A quick update: Although all of my out-of-pocket expenses were supposed to be reimbursed, we fought the healthcare company for three months to get that reimbursement, because, we were denied three times. They said finally, that we had sent our forms to the wrong department each time. Actually, it seemed to us that they were playing a war of attrition. Finally we were reimbursed for about 2/3rds of the cost, the amount we paid out of pocket in Italy was not reimbursed.
I also want to say that my experience may have been atypical, as cruise ship's have agents in each port that help deal with these situations, although after putting us in a taxi, we didn't see the agent again.
After a day of intestinal distress, the cramps started slowly just after 1 AM, then escalated, feeling like a knife stabbing me in the stomach. Finally at 2 AM, the pain was too intense to bear and I called the number given for medical emergences.
I was instructed to meet the cruise ship’s medical staff in 10 minutes in the ship infirmary and I staggered down the hallway and down the steps to the clinic.
They take food poisoning very seriously on a cruise ship and after getting some medication, the pain subsided and we felt as if the cramps were under control. For the next 24 hours I was to be quarantined - not allowed to leave my cabin – and my meals of oatmeal and chicken broth were delivered to my room.
Then, in the middle of the night, the excruciating pain began anew and another midnight trip to the infirmary. I was treated again, but a second attack was deemed serious enough by the ship’s doctors to warrant a trip to the Italian mainland the next day to the hospital to see a doctor and to have an ultrasound.
What? Italian health care? An Italian hospital? An Italian doctor? Do they even have modern medicine in Italy? All my ethnocentric fears of being ill outside of the U.S. had me wondering what kind of hellish experience I might be facing.
The ship’s agent had a taxi ready to take me to the hospital where I waited for about 20 minutes to see a doctor. The doctor had a kind and professional bedside manner and spent about a half an hour asking questions in English before he diagnosed the problem. He got on the phone and made an appointment with a radiologist who agreed to open thirty minutes early in order to conduct an ultrasound.
Much to my surprise, the doctor told me he would meet me at the radiologist and sure enough there he was consulting with the technician who performed it. There was no waiting and no line. He interpreted the results, made his observations and wrote a prescription. His fee was $100. Expecting the radiology bill, I asked if they took American Express. I was able to pay the $150 bill for the ultrasound with cash.
The taxi driver drove me to the only open pharmacy in the afternoon (everything closes in the afternoon in many European countries, but there’s always a pharmacy open by law.)
As I paid the $15 bill for my prescription, the radiologist walked into the pharmacy with all the medical paperwork I had mistakenly left behind at the radiology office.
The taxi driver drove me back to the ship and the rest of the trip was restful and uneventful.
Granted, I may have gotten special treatment because I needed to get back on the ship, but nonetheless, this was still an astounding look at what healthcare's like in Europe to an outsider.
Let’s recap what we’ve learned so far.
A radiology bill in the U.S. would be in the thousands of dollars and my co-pay would have been as much as the TOTAL bill in Italy.
I was able to get an ultrasound on the SAME DAY it was prescribed.
The last time I had an ultrasound in the U.S. I had to wait a weeks for the appointment, wait in an overcrowded room for them to call my name and then waited a week for the results.
My Italian doctor ACCOMPANIED me to the ultrasound procedure and instantly gave me the results.
The Italian radiologist left his office to deliver something to me I had left behind.
My regular monthly prescription in the U.S. has a co-pay of $50. When I left for my vacation, neither the pharmacist nor my physician were able to get my HMO to give me 60 days worth of pills. Finally, my doctor rounded up all the free samples he had in the office so I would have enough while on my trip.
The TOTAL price of my medicine in Italy was $15.
What would have taken me two to three weeks to get done in the U.S. was all done in ONE day.
Many people say we have the best healthcare system in the world.
Many people are afraid of having "socialized" medicine like they do in European countries.
The next time I visit my doctor or go to the pharmacy or have a medical procedure like an ultrasound, I’ll remember a day I spent in a foreign country’s healthcare system and wish I could get some of that good stuff here.