Socialized Medicine

I have never had much luck with hospitals in the States. My last visit ended up costing $600 to have the doctor say, "well, you're sick." Yep. Which is why I'm here, I said silently in my head. He gave me about 4 pain pills for my sore throat and his assurance that I would get better on my own.

My credit score had taken a big hit when I had to first deal with a $16,000 hospital stay, then after taking care of that, I had to deal with an additional $1,000 because of the emergency room visits. Who knew hospitals charged separately for the ER and the hospital stay?

Now on to Taiwan, and my first experience with socialized medicine.

There are many clinics spread out around the city. If you aren't looking for it, you'll probably miss most of them because they're so small, not like our sprawling hospital buildings in the US.

I finally went in yesterday because I've been getting sicker, and Parent-Teacher Days are this week. Not having good experiences in the states with hospitals and doctors, and being poor, I avoided it until someone convinced me to just go.

The entire visit, which included the medicine, cost me $150 NT, which roughly equals $5 US dollars. It was amazing. The health insurance cost around $13 US dollars PER MONTH. It's just comforting to know I have that option to prevent my sicknesses from getting worse, instead of waiting until I have no option other than to spend large amounts of money on getting better.

The doctor spoke English very well and knew what he was doing. He asked me why it took me so long to come into see him, and I didn't really want to go into how my credit score was devastated because of simply going into see a doctor at the hospital.

Anyways, just thought I'd share that experience. I only made it through one Parent-Teacher Day, today, Gloria made me get a substitute for my Afternoon Kindergarten class. I'll write more when I'm feeling better. The End. ^_^