stringbean
New member
You should probably talk to people who have used both systems. If you talk to a thousand people in the US you'll get a thousand different opinions because it all depends on what type of coverage you have. In London, you are accustomed to one method and that method applies to everyone; here it depends on which insurance company you have, what type of coverage your employer negotiated in their contract... Too many variables to give you a good answer.
I lived in Japan for two years and I will say that I much preferred their system. In two years, I never paid for any medical services or medicine (my daughter never had anything more than checkups or ear infections, so I didn't truly test the system.) A friend of mine there delivered six weeks prematurely and she stayed in the hospital for one week and her baby stayed for six weeks. She paid nothing. I have a friend here who had similar circumstances. She had to leave the hospital after 48 hours, the baby stayed for one month. They paid $10,000 out of pocket for all the neo-natal care and they had a ton of fights with the insurance company. I don't know anything about what the babies needed, so it may be an unfair comparison.
For another friend in Japan, the doctor found that her nine-month-old baby was deaf. She and her husband planned on moving stateside because they thought she'd be better off in the US. But they did check through the insurance plan of his company and discovered that some procedure that was considered routine in Japan was considered experimental in the US and NOT covered at all. It would have been about $25,000 out of pocket. They stayed in Japan for a few more months to have the procedure done.
Our daughter broke her nose and the insurance company decided surgery was cosmetic and denied coverage, despite having three doctors declare it was medically necessary. We appealed the decision, but they wouldn't cover it. While we fought with the ins co, our daughter's nose healed so we were facing a significantly more extensive procedure (rebreaking the nose and a couple days of hospitalization) and pay for the entire thing on our own. We decided against putting her through that, but to this day she continues to get headaches and sinus pain, so we may end up doing it after all.
The system here is hit or miss. If you get good coverage, you may think it's just wonderful. However, you may end up with high co-pays and insurance companies who make the decisions about medical care (and we are considered to have very good insurance -- but after living in a place with national coverage, I think our system is completely unfair.)
Find someone who has worked within both the US system and the National Care you have and talk to them. Otherwise, you are gathering opinions of people who have no comparison point. For some of us, it's worked really well. And for others of us, there are some shockingly bad stories.
I lived in Japan for two years and I will say that I much preferred their system. In two years, I never paid for any medical services or medicine (my daughter never had anything more than checkups or ear infections, so I didn't truly test the system.) A friend of mine there delivered six weeks prematurely and she stayed in the hospital for one week and her baby stayed for six weeks. She paid nothing. I have a friend here who had similar circumstances. She had to leave the hospital after 48 hours, the baby stayed for one month. They paid $10,000 out of pocket for all the neo-natal care and they had a ton of fights with the insurance company. I don't know anything about what the babies needed, so it may be an unfair comparison.
For another friend in Japan, the doctor found that her nine-month-old baby was deaf. She and her husband planned on moving stateside because they thought she'd be better off in the US. But they did check through the insurance plan of his company and discovered that some procedure that was considered routine in Japan was considered experimental in the US and NOT covered at all. It would have been about $25,000 out of pocket. They stayed in Japan for a few more months to have the procedure done.
Our daughter broke her nose and the insurance company decided surgery was cosmetic and denied coverage, despite having three doctors declare it was medically necessary. We appealed the decision, but they wouldn't cover it. While we fought with the ins co, our daughter's nose healed so we were facing a significantly more extensive procedure (rebreaking the nose and a couple days of hospitalization) and pay for the entire thing on our own. We decided against putting her through that, but to this day she continues to get headaches and sinus pain, so we may end up doing it after all.
The system here is hit or miss. If you get good coverage, you may think it's just wonderful. However, you may end up with high co-pays and insurance companies who make the decisions about medical care (and we are considered to have very good insurance -- but after living in a place with national coverage, I think our system is completely unfair.)
Find someone who has worked within both the US system and the National Care you have and talk to them. Otherwise, you are gathering opinions of people who have no comparison point. For some of us, it's worked really well. And for others of us, there are some shockingly bad stories.