[fucksong]

Hello all, just this morning I had to take a family member to the emergency room to a hospital in Los Angeles county and it was a fucked up experience. We ended up having to wait more than 4 hours to just speak with the doctor despite my family member throwing up continuously and having the worst stomach pain she's ever had in her life. But what was also sad was there were several babies in there crying, some old as guy in his 60's also barfing, just a bunch of fucked up people ALL WAITING due to no available doctors and this is supposed to be a first world country with world class healthcare? The workers were rude and bitchy (although to be fair to them, they're probably overworked and stressed). It got me thinking what emergency rooms were like in other countries, especially areas that are popular on this forum like EE and SEA as well as the rest of Asia and Europe (since I plan on visiting both next year)

Any horror stories, tips, good resources on how to find reputable hospitals that have good ER and doctors? Are the experiences abroad similar to what I experienced this morning?

Here is a good blog post by Tim Ferris about his nightmare experience in India:

http://fourhourworkweek.com/2011/10/02/b...-stoicism/

Thanks in advance,

[Onto]

If you're in Davao City, Philippines go to "Davao Doctors" Hospital. It's cleaner and more modern than the one behind G-Mall.

There is an ENT clinic at Davao Doctors that I went to and cost about 500 pesos. That's like $10 USD which would normally cost $250-$450 USD in America.

I thought the service was fine and the two young women who were doctor's-in-training were very cute as well.

[whoishe]

In Poland (specifically Warsaw, as I didn't have to visit ERs in different cities) your experience would be very similar. It takes a few hours to get interviewed by doctor and then next few hours to wait for results of blood test/necessary scans taken. You would have to be in life threatening condition to overcome it. Helps a little if you are brought by paramedics, but not always. I don't think any particular places stands out in Warsaw, it's always more of a lottery.

The worst thing is that National Health Foundation (government organization responsible for budgeting money for healh care) once published data that ERs are the best run part of health care in Poland and their example should be followed.

I actually had to visit a hospital a few times in my life (last year had a very serious eye infection for example) and my experience from there is relatively positive. But ER's... not so much.

This reminds me that hospitals are rotating regarding offering ERs through the week. So you need to check first where you should go if you have a very specific issue, like me with my eye infection - I knew where I have to go on Wednesday (and after various tests I was immediately registered to hospital), but it would be a different hospital offering ERs services on Thursday.

More standard injuries will be covered by standard ERs hospitals, not sure how many of them there is in Warsaw, but probably low double digit.

Also, never had to visit (and hopefully it will stay this way) hospital in Ukraine, but once I saw paramedics' car in Ivano-Frankivsk and it was in quite terrifying condition.

[berserk]

You need top notch health insurance or travel insurance and you go to private hospitals. There are probably many here who don't have insurance and they are playing a very dangerous game. A distant associate of mine is currently in an African country with tubes in him and a hospital bill that is rising $1000 or more a day. Can't get transferred to a proper hospital in the capital and can't get home. The risk of him dying is very high unfortunately.

I've been hospitalized twice abroad, both times at high end private hospitals, excellent care. Always check up on which private hospitals are where you are going.

The biggest danger is getting into a public hospital in poorer countries that do not speak English. I went with someone suspected of having a heart attack to a hospital in HCM and it was appallingly low standard. Found a private hospital fortunately afterwards.

Private hospitals are much higher level of care than public. Just make sure you have insurance.

[Marshy]

I've worked in ERs in both Sydney and Melbourne, Australia. and yes very similar circumstances. one thing that I always advise people that I know is to try smaller/ private hospitals if your condition isn't life threatening as the bigger metro hospitals are busy with the major traumas and more serious illness (obviously). another thing that can often get you in faster is presenting via ambulance as opposed to self presenting. since health care is more or less free in Australia, people will seek services without a second thought of cost etc so quite often waiting rooms are filled with patients who don't need emergency room care.

[mindanao]

(12-13-2014 04:43 PM)Onto Wrote:  

If you're in Davao City, Philippines go to "Davao Doctors" Hospital. It's cleaner and more modern than the one behind G-Mall.

There is an ENT clinic at Davao Doctors that I went to and cost about 500 pesos. That's like $10 USD which would normally cost $250-$450 USD in America.

I thought the service was fine and the two young women who were doctor's-in-training were very cute as well.

That is funny I was totally coming here to mention it and you already did.

It seemed very modern and nothing like the disaster described in LA. The place was quiet quiet and free of serious activity. When I came back the second time, I was not charged anything. It seemed as decent as a hospital experience in Canada. I wonder why, considering what type of country Philippines is seen as with corruption, pollution and overpopulation and stuff like that. Davao sure was a clean experience and seems devoid of the problems seen everywhere else.

[The_CEO]

https://www.iamat.org/

[jimukr104]

Quote:

Hello all, just this morning I had to take a family member to the emergency room to a hospital in Los Angeles county and it was a fucked up experience. We ended up having to wait more than 4 hours to just speak with the doctor despite my family member throwing up continuously and having the worst stomach pain she's ever had in her life. But what was also sad was there were several babies in there crying, some old as guy in his 60's also barfing, just a bunch of fucked up people ALL WAITING due to no available doctors and this is supposed to be a first world country with world class healthcare? The workers were rude and bitchy (although to be fair to them, they're probably overworked and stressed). It got me thinking what emergency rooms were like in other countries, especially areas that are popular on this forum like EE and SEA as well as the rest of Asia and Europe (since I plan on visiting both next year)

Not sure what you expected the whole system of emergency care is based on wait your turn with priority given to those in IMMEDIATE need. Don't think that is different anywhere.
US actually has one of the best acute care in emergency rooms due to the traffic and experience in bullet trauma AND more important the quick response of paramedics and ambulance crews.
You need to understand that most emergency rooms are staffed with the residents and least senior doctors. If you were a senior doctor would you want to be working graveyard in an emergency room? There is your answer.

2 things that set usa apart is equipment and ambulances. In many countries there is no ambulance service or there is a private one.

In Ukraine for example most don't survive acute heart attacks since there is few ambulance crews available.

[Alpharius]

Been in ER's in El Salvador, the USA, and China.

You'll wait forever in all of them if your condition isn't life threatening. Stomach pain and vomiting? If it's not an abdominal aortic aneurysm, it's not very life threatening.

Honestly, China was probably the worst. In El Salvador and the US I at least had professionals who knew what they were doing. In China they wanted to reuse IV needles and made me pay a fortune for clean stuff out of a new package.

I learned when doing my EMT training that saying you somehow injured your head can bump you up in the line. "My stomach hurt so bad I fell when getting out of bed and hit my head!" Never tried it as I figured it wouldn't be worth the costs of them examining my head.

Question for OP - why didn't you go to a minute clinic or urgent care instead of the ER?

[fucksong]

Hello all, thank you to everybody for giving their advice and feedback. I'm extremely tired from work so will reply to each post at a later date but did want to post the following info for those of you who are also concerned about finding reliable medical care abroad.

Based on the feedback provided, I realized that private care is the way to go as opposed to non-private care. I then did a lot of research and found the following websites very helpful in searching for a reputable hospital:

http://www.jointcommissioninternational....nizations/
http://www.patientsbeyondborders.com/hospital

There are also some well known US hospitals who have partnerships with providers abroad. You can find them here:
http://m.hopkinsmedicine.org/internation...iliations/
http://my.clevelandclinic.org/patients-v...sentatives

Apparently there are also companies that specialize in arranging medical tourism trips for US citizens so I'm sure they'd also be a good resource for being connected to English speaking providers abroad.

Another link with good info:
http://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-tr...oad.3.html

There's too much info to list here but the bad news is places like Ukraine did NOT have any hospital/provider in any of the lists. The closest place that appears on the list is in Turkey. Good news is there are tons of places in Thailand, one mentioned most often and that was also used by the founder of the website Patients Without Borders was this place in Bangkok:

https://www.bumrungrad.com/en/packages-promotions

They even list their prices for standard procedures.

Malaysia, Singapore, Phillipines, South Korea, Taiwan, China all had several and even a few in Vietnam. I found one in Japan that has a partnership with John Hopkins located in Tokyo midtown:

http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/internati...enter.html

I also found several in Latin America but since I don't have any immediate plans for going there, don't have any to list but again, just use the first four sites I listed above and you'll see a good list.

While just being on these lists doesn't guarantee they'll give great service, in my opinion, at least it's a filter for which you can start from in searching for a good doctor.

Finally, regarding insurance, I'm still doing research as to who is good and who'll pay up. For us in the US, I've narrowed down the search to Cigna, Blue Shield Blue Cross and Aetna and will post updates once I find out the answer. I don't want to double post info so I'll post that info in this thread which is more applicable to that topic:

http://www.rooshvforum.network/thread-16120....+insurance

Thanks again all!

[Rawmeo]

Each place is different and varies depending on the day / number of people, etc.

For example, I was born in America, and the healthcare system is free for all Quebec residents having the provincial government health card (free & mandatory). However the wait times are very long, sometimes 8 hours to see a doctor, so most people avoir going there unless it's absolutely needed. In other provinces, I heard it's better, but I never tried it myself.

An average of $250 - $450 in America seems a bit high, considering that many countries in America offer very cheap health care. My guess is that USA is probably the highest if you do not have any private insurance.

I'll let you on an event that happened to me last year at the ER in Quebec; since it takes around 8 hours to see a doctor, people in the waiting room tend to be very wary of people waiting to see the doctor for non-urgent reasons, such as someone "I have a headache", etc. and while I was waiting, I overheard a conversation between an old man and a younger 30-ish lady not far from me.

Old man: "So why are you here?"
Her: "I feel like trouble when breathing, and I feel weak and not a lot of energy sometimes."
Old man: "Hmm... all right".
Her: "Hey, can you watch my seat 5 minutes? I'm going to have a smoke outside, if they call me name XXXXXXXXXX just let me know when I'm back."
<she leaves, and 2 minutes after, her name is called>
During that time, old man: "So I'm waiting here since 7 hours because I'm unable to eat anything for days now, and those people think they can just smoke and get free health care after?" (and goes on 5-minute rambling about how taxpayers spend money to cure people who smoke, etc.)
<the lady comes back>
Her: "So, anyone called my name?"
Old man: "Nope".
Nobody in the waiting room told her.

[berserk]

In Bangkok, Samitivej Hospital is equally good as Bumrungrad and cheaper with some stuff.

[WanderingSoul]

I've been to a few hospitals in Bangkok, but never the actual ER. For standard health care and such things are fine, but I wouldn't want to be in a life or death situation here.

For one, good luck getting to the hospital in a timely manner if you really need to get there. Every time I see an ambulance driving down Sukhumvit in gridlocked traffic I think "Another one bites the dust." because that poor motherfucker isn't getting to the hospital anytime soon.

I also don't trust the medical staff here very much. I had one buddy go to the hospital to get tests done for his work permit, and he also decided to get an HIV test and some other tests. The doctor told him he didn't need an HIV test. If he had HIV, he'd know it. Those words came out of the mouth of a doctor.

I know another person who almost died in a hospital because they didn't have the money to move her to a hospital with the specialist that she needed, into a private hospital, so she was going to die until some friends pulled together and got the money to have her transferred. It wasn't cheap.

For your basic shit BKK is much cheaper to have medical treatment and I've been pretty happy with the overall treatment I have received. But if I had a life or death situation I hope to god I'm in the US and not here.

[Chaos]

Actually, the government hospitals in Russia are free. If you can handle the waiting....

However, what beserk said is spot on.
Don't go anywhere without a decent travel insurance!

Yes, I know it sucks to pay it but you will thank god when an accident happens.

This summer I broke a toe and got Dengue fever at the same time in Thailand.
The doctor at the international clinic in Koh Chang didn't know shit so he just wrapped some bandaid around my toe. Even the dumbest person on the planet could have seen that something is wrong with my toe.

Then I stopped fucking around and went straight to Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok.
The toe needed surgery, they took a shitload of bloodtests due to the ongoing fengue fever. In the evening the doctor decided pulled me in for surgery.

All in all the whole hospital visit costed me almost 5000€.
At that point it felt pretty damn good to have a decent insurance that covered everything. No questions asked.

[Cheetah]

Beware that in some places they might try to sell you medical care that is not really needed.

[malakaix]

(12-18-2014 06:41 AM)Chaos Wrote:  

All in all the whole hospital visit costed me almost 5000€.
At that point it felt pretty damn good to have a decent insurance that covered everything. No questions asked.

Holy shit.. that's expensive. Lucky.

I've never had to goto an ER while in a foreign country.. but i did get extremely ill while i was in Hungary and had to go to the doctor, i developed what felt like the worst flu of my life.. hadn't slept for two days due to stomach nausea, also couldn't eat for this reason and the fever i had was hitting 104F.

I was able to see the doctor almost immediately with no appointment and he spoke quite good English.. turned out i had a nasty viral infection which they treated with an injection and a prescription of antibiotics.. cost me 50€.. but honestly i would of paid anything in that situation.

[micha]

I got sick in Ukraine once and ever since my desire to travel has decreased substantially. It can be absolute horror.

Incompetent doctors, poor hygiene standards and outdated equipment. When that pairs with a little bit of bad luck you might actually end up dead.

In my case a translator exaggerated certain symptoms to the doctor. I was lucky to pick up on it and in the end refused some of the medicine that I was prescribed. When I asked why she did it, she said: "Because else they won't take you seriously around here."
I remember thinking: "This is it. This is how I die."

I had always been hungry for adventures but the price can be very high. I read the Blogpost of Tim Ferris and I guess everyone else but him would have gone home either dead or with life long health issues.

Maybe certain parts of the world will remain undiscovered by me, but once you realize how important and fragile your health is, it becomes really hard to not think of the risks involved.

[Sonoma]

In the US, if you don't have health insurance just LIE. Fake name, fake address, fake everything. They don't look it up and don't find out til they go to bill weeks later

Only downside is you can't get prescriptions or follow up visits- it's ER only

[fucksong]

(12-13-2014 04:43 PM)Onto Wrote:  

If you're in Davao City, Philippines go to "Davao Doctors" Hospital. It's cleaner and more modern than the one behind G-Mall.

There is an ENT clinic at Davao Doctors that I went to and cost about 500 pesos. That's like $10 USD which would normally cost $250-$450 USD in America.

I thought the service was fine and the two young women who were doctor's-in-training were very cute as well.

Thanks for the tip. I'll add it to my PI list.

(12-13-2014 05:04 PM)whoishe Wrote:  

In Poland (specifically Warsaw, as I didn't have to visit ERs in different cities) your experience would be very similar. It takes a few hours to get interviewed by doctor and then next few hours to wait for results of blood test/necessary scans taken. You would have to be in life threatening condition to overcome it. Helps a little if you are brought by paramedics, but not always. I don't think any particular places stands out in Warsaw, it's always more of a lottery.

The worst thing is that National Health Foundation (government organization responsible for budgeting money for healh care) once published data that ERs are the best run part of health care in Poland and their example should be followed.

I actually had to visit a hospital a few times in my life (last year had a very serious eye infection for example) and my experience from there is relatively positive. But ER's... not so much.

This reminds me that hospitals are rotating regarding offering ERs through the week. So you need to check first where you should go if you have a very specific issue, like me with my eye infection - I knew where I have to go on Wednesday (and after various tests I was immediately registered to hospital), but it would be a different hospital offering ERs services on Thursday.

More standard injuries will be covered by standard ERs hospitals, not sure how many of them there is in Warsaw, but probably low double digit.

Also, never had to visit (and hopefully it will stay this way) hospital in Ukraine, but once I saw paramedics' car in Ivano-Frankivsk and it was in quite terrifying condition.

Yeah, I can't remember 100% for sure but I don't think I saw any Poland hospitals on the accredited lists either.

(12-13-2014 05:27 PM)berserk Wrote:  

You need top notch health insurance or travel insurance and you go to private hospitals. There are probably many here who don't have insurance and they are playing a very dangerous game. A distant associate of mine is currently in an African country with tubes in him and a hospital bill that is rising $1000 or more a day. Can't get transferred to a proper hospital in the capital and can't get home. The risk of him dying is very high unfortunately.

I've been hospitalized twice abroad, both times at high end private hospitals, excellent care. Always check up on which private hospitals are where you are going.

The biggest danger is getting into a public hospital in poorer countries that do not speak English. I went with someone suspected of having a heart attack to a hospital in HCM and it was appallingly low standard. Found a private hospital fortunately afterwards.

Private hospitals are much higher level of care than public. Just make sure you have insurance.

Hey Berserk, thanks for feedback but as was discussed in the other thread on travel insurance, it's hard to discern which companies are actually good and reliable. Companies might list many benefits but when it comes down to crunch time, there are many stories of companies failing to deliver, especially when they're needed most.

(12-13-2014 07:43 PM)The_CEO Wrote:  

https://www.iamat.org/

Thanks CEO, just signed up on this site. I wished they allowed searches without having to sign up but it did provide additional info. I would probably still use the sites that I had listed in my post above and cross reference it with this list. What's nice about this site is they list the actual doctors.

The bad news is Ukraine and South Korea do NOT list any doctors there and Thailand, which has TONS listed on the other sites, has only a few listed here so I'm not sure if that's a good thing as they have more stringent criteria or if it's a bad thing as they're not as well known, so therefore maybe easier to join if they just pay a fee.

Either case, it's an additional filter so thanks.

(12-13-2014 07:56 PM)jimukr104 Wrote:  

2 things that set usa apart is equipment and ambulances. In many countries there is no ambulance service or there is a private one.

In Ukraine for example most don't survive acute heart attacks since there is few ambulance crews available.

One of the first two websites I listed above actually have a field where you can search for hospitals that have an ambulance program. There isn't many but for travelers like myself where this is a concern, it's an additional filter

(12-13-2014 08:10 PM)Osiris Wrote:  

Been in ER's in El Salvador, the USA, and China.

You'll wait forever in all of them if your condition isn't life threatening. Stomach pain and vomiting? If it's not an abdominal aortic aneurysm, it's not very life threatening.

Honestly, China was probably the worst. In El Salvador and the US I at least had professionals who knew what they were doing. In China they wanted to reuse IV needles and made me pay a fortune for clean stuff out of a new package.

I learned when doing my EMT training that saying you somehow injured your head can bump you up in the line. "My stomach hurt so bad I fell when getting out of bed and hit my head!" Never tried it as I figured it wouldn't be worth the costs of them examining my head.

Question for OP - why didn't you go to a minute clinic or urgent care instead of the ER?

What up Osiris, yeah your post made me really want to filter out good hospitals to find out if they re-used needles or not. Sorry to hear you had that experience. As I mentioned above, while just being on those lists doesnt automatically mean they're great, at least it's a filter of who's good and who's ghetto. While I have yet to actually call any of those hospitals to ask if they reuse needles or not, I'm hoping that the JCCI accreditation would have some requirement that needles NOT be re-used. Or some of the more well known hospital partnerships, I'm sure if you're a multi million dollar business, you're not going to want to "taint" your brand by associating with another hospital that practices unsafe procedures such as reusing needles.

As for minute clinic, not sure what that is? I'm in LA county at the moment but am planning a long term world wide trip next year and don't want my plans to get fucked up over a medical emergency that could be handled with proper planning.

(12-18-2014 12:18 AM)alex3948 Wrote:  

Each place is different and varies depending on the day / number of people, etc.

For example, I was born in America, and the healthcare system is free for all Quebec residents having the provincial government health card (free & mandatory). However the wait times are very long, sometimes 8 hours to see a doctor, so most people avoir going there unless it's absolutely needed. In other provinces, I heard it's better, but I never tried it myself.

An average of $250 - $450 in America seems a bit high, considering that many countries in America offer very cheap health care. My guess is that USA is probably the highest if you do not have any private insurance.

I'll let you on an event that happened to me last year at the ER in Quebec; since it takes around 8 hours to see a doctor, people in the waiting room tend to be very wary of people waiting to see the doctor for non-urgent reasons, such as someone "I have a headache", etc. and while I was waiting, I overheard a conversation between an old man and a younger 30-ish lady not far from me.

Old man: "So why are you here?"
Her: "I feel like trouble when breathing, and I feel weak and not a lot of energy sometimes."
Old man: "Hmm... all right".
Her: "Hey, can you watch my seat 5 minutes? I'm going to have a smoke outside, if they call me name XXXXXXXXXX just let me know when I'm back."
<she leaves, and 2 minutes after, her name is called>
During that time, old man: "So I'm waiting here since 7 hours because I'm unable to eat anything for days now, and those people think they can just smoke and get free health care after?" (and goes on 5-minute rambling about how taxpayers spend money to cure people who smoke, etc.)
<the lady comes back>
Her: "So, anyone called my name?"
Old man: "Nope".
Nobody in the waiting room told her.

Hey Alex, Montreal was one of the places on my list but then I found out that 4 of the worst hospitals are located there so your story isn't surprising. Here's the link:

http://montreal.ctvnews.ca/according-to-...-1.1079004

(12-18-2014 05:31 AM)berserk Wrote:  

In Bangkok, Samitivej Hospital is equally good as Bumrungrad and cheaper with some stuff.

Thanks for the heads up. I'll check em out. I only mentioned Bumrungrad as the founder of Patients Beyond Borders actually used them. It'd be like if Roosh liked staying at some hostel in Ukraine for it's good logistics. The fact that someone who studies this shit on a regular basis actually said good things about a place is a great filter in my opinion. But will def keep in mind. Overall, Thailand seems to be a better place to stay if you or a loved one has health problems or are concerned about health problems vs Eastern Europe (based on the research I found on those sites above)

(12-18-2014 06:16 AM)RioNomad Wrote:  

I've been to a few hospitals in Bangkok, but never the actual ER. For standard health care and such things are fine, but I wouldn't want to be in a life or death situation here.

For one, good luck getting to the hospital in a timely manner if you really need to get there. Every time I see an ambulance driving down Sukhumvit in gridlocked traffic I think "Another one bites the dust." because that poor motherfucker isn't getting to the hospital anytime soon.

I also don't trust the medical staff here very much. I had one buddy go to the hospital to get tests done for his work permit, and he also decided to get an HIV test and some other tests. The doctor told him he didn't need an HIV test. If he had HIV, he'd know it. Those words came out of the mouth of a doctor.

I know another person who almost died in a hospital because they didn't have the money to move her to a hospital with the specialist that she needed, into a private hospital, so she was going to die until some friends pulled together and got the money to have her transferred. It wasn't cheap.

For your basic shit BKK is much cheaper to have medical treatment and I've been pretty happy with the overall treatment I have received. But if I had a life or death situation I hope to god I'm in the US and not here.

Good point about traffic. If I bring an elderly relative with me to Bangkok, I might want to post up near a good hospital so am hoping one of em are near the hotspots for chicks.

Do you remember offhand the name of the hospitals? I'd be curious to see if any of them were the higher rated ones on the list or not? As for life or death issue, my rationale is that while America's ERs are better than most of the world, our lifestyle promotes the need for it. If you're living on the cheap, beautiful women around, living life to the fullest, I'm thinking your lifespan will naturally be less stressful and happier so thus will live longer vs living a typical US lifestyle where you are stuck in traffic for a few hours everyday, in an office cubicle everyday around other poor sheep who are stuck in the same rat race, eating fast food, lack of inspiration and will therefore have more health problems.

(12-18-2014 06:41 AM)Chaos Wrote:  

Actually, the government hospitals in Russia are free. If you can handle the waiting....

However, what beserk said is spot on.
Don't go anywhere without a decent travel insurance!

Yes, I know it sucks to pay it but you will thank god when an accident happens.

This summer I broke a toe and got Dengue fever at the same time in Thailand.
The doctor at the international clinic in Koh Chang didn't know shit so he just wrapped some bandaid around my toe. Even the dumbest person on the planet could have seen that something is wrong with my toe.

Then I stopped fucking around and went straight to Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok.
The toe needed surgery, they took a shitload of bloodtests due to the ongoing fengue fever. In the evening the doctor decided pulled me in for surgery.

All in all the whole hospital visit costed me almost 5000€.
At that point it felt pretty damn good to have a decent insurance that covered everything. No questions asked.

Chaos! What's the name of the travel insurance you had?? That's the million dollar question (for me at least)?

Did you have to pay upfront? If so, how long did it take to get reimbursed?

(12-18-2014 06:49 AM)Cheetah Wrote:  

Beware that in some places they might try to sell you medical care that is not really needed.

Yeah, that sucks but what can we do? The only thing I can think of to prevent this is to go to the top hospitals because they have more to lose if one were to find out about their practices.

(12-18-2014 07:13 AM)malakaix Wrote:  

(12-18-2014 06:41 AM)Chaos Wrote:  

All in all the whole hospital visit costed me almost 5000€.
At that point it felt pretty damn good to have a decent insurance that covered everything. No questions asked.

Holy shit.. that's expensive. Lucky.

I've never had to goto an ER while in a foreign country.. but i did get extremely ill while i was in Hungary and had to go to the doctor, i developed what felt like the worst flu of my life.. hadn't slept for two days due to stomach nausea, also couldn't eat for this reason and the fever i had was hitting 104F.

I was able to see the doctor almost immediately with no appointment and he spoke quite good English.. turned out i had a nasty viral infection which they treated with an injection and a prescription of antibiotics.. cost me 50€.. but honestly i would of paid anything in that situation.

Hungary was the only place in Eastern Europe that had good healthcare per the websites listed above. If I were to live in Eastern Europe, I'd try to make some time to visit Hungary for checkups and what not.

(12-18-2014 02:44 PM)micha Wrote:  

I got sick in Ukraine once and ever since my desire to travel has decreased substantially. It can be absolute horror.

Incompetent doctors, poor hygiene standards and outdated equipment. When that pairs with a little bit of bad luck you might actually end up dead.

In my case a translator exaggerated certain symptoms to the doctor. I was lucky to pick up on it and in the end refused some of the medicine that I was prescribed. When I asked why she did it, she said: "Because else they won't take you seriously around here."
I remember thinking: "This is it. This is how I die."

I had always been hungry for adventures but the price can be very high. I read the Blogpost of Tim Ferris and I guess everyone else but him would have gone home either dead or with life long health issues.

Maybe certain parts of the world will remain undiscovered by me, but once you realize how important and fragile your health is, it becomes really hard to not think of the risks involved.

Hey Micha, sorry to hear your story. Your experience is the exact reason I'm doing so much damn research on this topic. However, I don't want to let this one issue stop me from traveling the world to meet hot exotic chicks and experiencing life. But it's just like hooking up with girls. We need to have logistics ironed out with contingency plans. I have even more of a challenge as I need to take care of an elderly relative during part of my world trip so am thinking of finding places to live NEAR EACH RELIABLE HOSPITAL. I also want to have the best travel insurance with Medical evacuation coverage and also a savings cushion to cover any upfront costs I might need to pay while waiting for reimbursement.

Here in US, we have this thing called Life Alert where it's a pendant that has a button on it where if an old person were to fall, they could press that button and automatically a rep from the company would call and if the person doesn't answer, they'd call an ambulance to check up on them. I'm hoping other countries have that but if not, I might just hire a nanny or whoever to watch my relative while I'm out banging chicks.

Worst case scenario is instead of multiple countries, I just focus on one or two with better healthcare logistics and take a trip on my own for a shorter period as opposed to living in the country. An example would be Ukraine since it seems you're fucked if you have health problems.

(12-18-2014 04:15 PM)Sonoma Wrote:  

In the US, if you don't have health insurance just LIE. Fake name, fake address, fake everything. They don't look it up and don't find out til they go to bill weeks later

Only downside is you can't get prescriptions or follow up visits- it's ER only

Solid tip

[Brodiaga]

(12-18-2014 04:15 PM)Sonoma Wrote:  

In the US, if you don't have health insurance just LIE. Fake name, fake address, fake everything. They don't look it up and don't find out til they go to bill weeks later

Only downside is you can't get prescriptions or follow up visits- it's ER only

But the first thing they ask you is SSN. Do they have a way of checking if you just make it up?

[DarkTriad]

(12-13-2014 04:25 PM)fucksong Wrote:  

Hello all, just this morning I had to take a family member to the emergency room to a hospital in Los Angeles county and it was a fucked up experience. We ended up having to wait more than 4 hours to just speak with the doctor despite my family member throwing up continuously and having the worst stomach pain she's ever had in her life. But what was also sad was there were several babies in there crying, some old as guy in his 60's also barfing, just a bunch of fucked up people ALL WAITING due to no available doctors and this is supposed to be a first world country with world class healthcare? The workers were rude and bitchy (although to be fair to them, they're probably overworked and stressed). It got me thinking what emergency rooms were like in other countries, especially areas that are popular on this forum like EE and SEA as well as the rest of Asia and Europe (since I plan on visiting both next year)

Any horror stories, tips, good resources on how to find reputable hospitals that have good ER and doctors? Are the experiences abroad similar to what I experienced this morning?

Here is a good blog post by Tim Ferris about his nightmare experience in India:

http://fourhourworkweek.com/2011/10/02/b...-stoicism/

Thanks in advance,

You're complaining about a First World hospital ER that has been ordered to treat all the people from a 3rd World country. When you get enough 3rd World population, you stop getting First World service.