Also, you don’t have to go to Canada for a wait list. Try calling a USA GI specialist office for a first appointment. Some are scheduling for 7 months out.

Val M.D. proves the point that if you don’t have enough money in the U.S., you’re never going to get treatment. Nevermind a wait. And just today I was reading a blog where someone in Boston had to wait 4.5 months for a procedure, and goes on to say that a lot of people are using the ED because the wait for specialists is too long for them. Wow, it doesn’t only happen up here in Canada! The only reason no one hears about these American stories is because the health system in the states is not accountable to anyone, whereas in Canada, it *is* held accountable. When there’s a problem, it gets reported to the public so that we can lobby to get things fixed. Over the past few years there are programs that have been implemented to improve wait times, but these thing take time. Healthcare is complex and wait times won’t be solved right away. Before you bash a system you know nothing about, take a look at your own problems first.

Anecdotal evidence is never sufficient, never. Anyone involved in medicine should know that. That one story about a six year wait does in no way reflect the system as a whole. That’s all there is to it. These little anecdotal stories falsely skew people’s perceptions as to the state of healthcare up here. The simple fact remains that there are statistics that can be accessed by anybody (you have to a little research), not just those with “an agenda”.

And btw, the Frasier Institute which is often quoted on this site, is well out on the fringes of the wacky right-wing in this country. They’re always publishing highly biased reports and trying to shift the national agenda more to the right. They’re not given much creedence up here, and really should stop being quoted. It just discredits whoever is using them to argue a point.

Further, the people able to access the data (the various provinces ministries of health in Canada, and the NHS in the UK) are hardly dispassionate reporters of fact. They have an agenda, to convince the taxpaying subjects that their health care is fine – no matter what.

The Frasier Institute http://www.fraserinstitute.ca/shared/readmore.asp?sNav=pb&id=658
conducts annual surveys and reports on the Canadian health care debacle.

News reports by CTV (hardly a conservative organ of anything) report 6-year waits for a consult (not treatment):
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/print/CTVNews/20070223/back_patients_070224/20070224/?hub=TopStories&subhub=PrintStory

While the CTV story may not be journal-quality, if the facts related in the story are untrue, it should be easy enough to disprove it.

In short, if there is this much smoke, there just might be a fire around. And hiding one’s head in the ground going ‘la-la-la’ while people attemt to show these facts isn’t a justification, an explanation, or a denial.

“But the problem with universal health care is worse than dirty, rat-infested hospitals with the normal hospital staff replaced with uncaring bureaucrats straight out of the DMV. In Canada and Britain, which both have this type of socialized health care, actual health care services are strictly rationed. I’ve read more reports than I care to count of people whose doctors don’t care one bit for them, and just move them through “routine” visits, and of people who die while on months-long waiting lists for necessary life-saving procedures such as emergency heart surgery. In fact, this is the norm in every country with socialized health care.”

He obviously doesn’t know what he’s talking about at all. Canada and Britain have vastly different systems, we sure as hell don’t have rotting mould and rats in our hospitals. How can he even begin to think that the military system is the same as the Canadian system?

I understand that the American government is horrible, and I can see why such a system might not work in the U.S. because no American government would properly fund the system.

Daniel, I liked your post. I think it made a lot of sense.

I also know at least one doc who makes housecalls (but for elderly or immobile patients only). Of course, there have always been those docs who treat only the rich-n-famous and they make house calls.

Kathy in Kentucky

Medicare, Medicaid, and HMO’s where one has overwhelming market share, in paying everyone the same fee for care, create a race to the bottom in quality of care. The faster and shoddier the service, the more money you make. The less resource you put in, the bigger the profit. Medicare is a raw deal for a doctor with pride in his work. It is a great deal for a quack. 30$ for 5$ worth of service is great money–for $100 worth of service it is an insult.

The free market does not always deliver good service–but at least I can move my business elsewhere–and pay more if that is what I have to do in order to get the service I want. That is the critical thing to keep–freedom. Medicare patients do not really have it. The myth is that they can see any doctor. The fact is they can see any doctor willing to deliver a service commensurate with the value Medicare puts on it–but Medicare isn’t the one that is sick. The doctor that practices to a higher standard and finds he can’t do it for the Medicare price, is not available to that patient.