I’ve got a couple of interesting stories to tell about Canadian health care, from two different, yet personal perspectives:
First, my mother, who’s currently battling cancer, has had an extremely positive experience with the Canadian health care system. Diagnosis was made quickly, with all necessary diagnostic appointments booked in a timely fashion (Ultrasound, CT, MRI, blood work). Treatment, at the cutting edge of the research for her type of cancer, was equally rapid with no waiting period.
Her oncologist is at the forefront of her field and is considered a world-renowned expert in this area (so much for the brain-drain!). The hospital, one of the oldest in Montreal (and slated for replacement in the near future), has a recently renovated oncology wing so the accommodations post-surgery and during chemo were clean, bright, and warm. The staff has been uniformly supportive and skilled, with a full team including oncological nurses and psychologists in place to attend to her needs. And, of course, at no time was there any question of treatment options being denied due to cost concerns.
Then there is my brother, the Emergency Medicine physician. He just returned to Montreal after completing his three year Emergency residency in Atlanta, at the Emory University hospitals. Most of the time he was working at Grady Memorial, which any of the Atlanta residents here will tell you is as busy, battered and financially bruised a US public hospital as any out there. Now he’s stationed at various McGill University hospitals, and still a resident (as here in Canada, the College of Emergency Physicians requires 5 years of residency). He’s just finished his first month of Canadian health care, and he’s seriously concerned about the system here, specifically as an ER doc. His primary beef is that a lack of nursing staff and rooms in Internal Medicine means that a lot more people end up in stretchers lining the hallways of the Emergency Room. In the US, even at the worst of public hospitals, apparently there has been more of a focus on getting people out of the ER and into the wards. He also complains about the facilities being dirty, and aged, but that’s because he’s working in the same hospital where my mother was treated, and as I mentioned, it’s due to be replaced by a new McGill “Superhospital”. I don’t think renovations are very common there, and are focused on the more critical areas.
All that to say that I don’t think I’d be as happy in an Emergency Room in Montreal as I would be in the US, but I’d get over it quickly when realizing that there’s no big bill heading my way once they get me out of my hallway stretcher. With serious illness, though, even backwards Quebec seems to be able to take care of its residents.
I personally would not trade my current health care coverage for anything offered in the US.