[NA]Medical Tourism[NA]

Let me cite another example: this week a patient called demanding to be seen immediately for her long standing hip pain. Although my normal waiting period or a new patient is over three months, we scheduled her a day and a half later, my first day in the office, and she was the first patient of the day as well. She arrived early, and started complaining to the staff why she wasn't being seen right away, over an hour before her visit.

When she was put into a room, she started to complain that she refused to be seen by a resident or PA, which is our normal procedure. Still, OK so far.

As soon as I walked in and introduced myself, she started going off on me about the staff, waiting, etc. After trying to explain the process, I proceeded to ask some questions about her hip, at which point she said I should look it up in the computer and that it was a waste of her time. At this point I said we were there to help her, but I would not tolerate rude behaviour Howard me or my staff. It became clear that despite our best-efforts, there was no way we could help her, and I suggested she go elsewhere. On theway out she called me a bunch of names, but of course if I had responded in kind, I would have been at fault.

To your point, we tried our best, but I am not the only fellowship trained orthopaedic surgeon in our city, and I am not obligated by any standard to provide care for her.
 
Jim:

Good call.
 
Anyone who puts up with the "general public" to provide medical care, is a Saint in my eyes. My wife is a home-care nurse (well, actually her latest adventure is on up past case manager to Assistant Dir of Nursing for a medium sized team of home-care nurses).

The abuses you folks take from people on a regular basis is astounding. If people treated anyone in the telecom manufacturer/tech support biz that I've been in for 15 years even half as badly, we'd quietly let their service contract lapse, jack the price up ten-fold at renewal time, or just drop the contract outright.

And then there's stuff like the war hero veteran widower Alzheimer's patient with no children or any real relatives, that my wife went to see for wound-care, that when she walked into his home, was trying to remember how to load his handgun to kill himself, and had to be admitted to a care facility after a brief run from the police, who were required to be called by law...

I for one, think you Docs & Nurses are amazing humans. Thanks for putting up with all of us wacko sick people.

While I've known some very affable and smart lawyers over the years, I'll take one Doc or Nurse over ten Attorneys any day of the week, if that were my only choice.
 
The hospital 60 minutes profiled was Bumrungrad Hospital (http://www.bumrungrad.com/index-inter.aspx) in Thailand. I have made several trips there while I was living in Asia and it is, IMHO, quite good. A seriously complete annual physical is about $360. No hassles with insurance, all medical records including xrays in English on a DVD at checkout. Great service.
 
And then there's stuff like the war hero veteran widower Alzheimer's patient with no children or any real relatives, that my wife went to see for wound-care, that when she walked into his home, was trying to remember how to load his handgun to kill himself, and had to be admitted to a care facility after a brief run from the police, who were required to be called by law...

Pity he wasn't allowed to do it. Alzheimer's really sucks. I'd rather eat the barrel of a gun than go through that.
 
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