Universal Nightmare - chime in Canadians!

[MPS]

Thanks Dave B, you just reminded me in another thread to post this. I have been meaning to.

I watched "Universal Nightmare" on Fox hosted by Hannity. A couple Canadians and Brits chimed in and told their nightmares about socialized medicine.

We have the finest health care in the world because of the free market system. I guarantee it won't be that way if we go socialized....many will go out of business. ....and who will want to be a doctor when they turn 32 and have a mountain of school loans to pay and they make a fixed government salary!

Tell us your thoughts and experiences Canadians.

 

[triple]

I don't even know how much I pay for premiums if that's any indication of how cheap it is here. If you go to the hospital with a broken arm, 99.9% of the time you are in quick. If you go with your snotty nosed kid who seems to be fighting a cold, prepare to wait (and rightly so).

The biggest drain on the system here where I live is the aboriginal people. You can go to our hospital any time day or night and the place is packed with freeloaders. They drink themselves into sickness, don't have jobs, don't pay a dime into the system and seem to always be there.

I think if you need somehting important and it's a matter of life and limb, you get taken care of. If you want a facelift or something elective, prepare to wait your turn.

If the new US socialized medical program becomes welfare medical, then you're going to have problems. If it's a program like ours where you all pay something and your employeres kicks in then it's good.

Just my $0.02.

Thanks for listening.

 

[x-guy]

personally I think its time that you quit using our medicare as a punching bag. It may not be perfect, but neither is yours, and I am quite frankly sick of our system which in my opinion isnt all that bad being dragged through the mud because some Americans are pissed off about "socializing" medicare. Come up with some other arguments rather than pointing your fingers across the border and telling us Canadians how crappy we have it, because like I said, its not perfect, but its far better than what some of you make it out to be.

 

[MPS]

personally I think its time that you quit using our medicare as a punching bag. It may not be perfect, but neither is yours, and I am quite frankly sick of our system which in my opinion isnt all that bad being dragged through the mud because some Americans are pissed off about "socializing" medicare. Come up with some other arguments rather than pointing your fingers across the border and telling us Canadians how crappy we have it, because like I said, its not perfect, but its far better than what some of you make it out to be.

Wow, how did I use your system as a punching bag? You are sick of your system, but then you say it isn't that bad? WTH, which is it? What better case studies are out there than to look at your country and the Brits!? Why would we want to make the same mistake if it has already been tried and doesn't work? I didn't say you have it crappy. I mentioned a Brit and a Canadian had bad experiences. I wanted to get more opinions because I don't want to rely on two stories from Fox. No, I definitely don't think it will give much incentive to doctors. You a bit oversensitive?

Thanks for your .02 triple! Yes, I completely agree about the freeloaders....there are plenty here and I only seeing it getting worse with socialized medicine.
.

 

[DaveB]

Our medical system is BAD. As mentioned, when you go in with a visible emergency (IE: leaking or broken/bent) you get treatment. But, try going in with an AILMENT. Any ailment that requires diagnosis will be misdiagnosed and mistreated 17 times before they get around to the right thing. "Here's some pills...bye" is what you get. My neck and back issues have been going on for years. I absolutely refuse to go to the hospital unless I am in real dire straights. Went in with a bad back in 2004, carried by my buddy at 4:30am....no x-rays, no nothing. "Here's some pain pills, bye". Took a year to heal on its own. This January I went in with an excruciating sore neck....drove myself sitting sideways in the seat with my right ear on my right shoulder to get through the pain. Again at 4:00am. Sat there over an hour in an empty waiting room, then got the "hmmm, what seems to be the problem? Here's some pills, bye" F$%K them! My father was in and out of the emergency for 3 years before they finally figured out it was cancer. Then they gave him medicine that acted against his stroke medicine and near killed him. I realize cancer is a bad deal, but I can't help but think that had it been diagnosed 2.5 years sooner, he might still be around. F%$k them.

edit: here's another thing. I've been in Red Deer since 91 and still don't have a family doctor. Why? Because you have to APPLY to become a patient, when they are accepting new patients. Then, after you are deemed acceptable to be a patient, you must book ahead 3 months for any checkups or issues. So I go to the walk-in clinics and hang out with the kids with the clap and the natives waiting for free pills. If you actually get sick....see above for emerg room proceedures. Which, as mentioned, if you go to between 8am and 9pm is full of natives waiting for free pills. F%$k them too.

 

[MPS]

Our medical system is BAD. As mentioned, when you go in with a visible emergency (IE: leaking or broken/bent) you get treatment. But, try going in with an AILMENT. Any ailment that requires diagnosis will be misdiagnosed and mistreated 17 times before they get around to the right thing. "Here's some pills...bye" is what you get. My neck and back issues have been going on for years. I absolutely refuse to go to the hospital unless I am in real dire straights. Went in with a bad back in 2004, carried by my buddy at 4:30am....no x-rays, no nothing. "Here's some pain pills, bye". Took a year to heal on its own. This January I went in with an excruciating sore neck....drove myself sitting sideways in the seat with my right ear on my right shoulder to get through the pain. Again at 4:00am. Sat there over an hour in an empty waiting room, then got the "hmmm, what seems to be the problem? Here's some pills, bye" F$%K them! My father was in and out of the emergency for 3 years before they finally figured out it was cancer. Then they gave him medicine that acted against his stroke medicine and near killed him. I realize cancer is a bad deal, but I can't help but think that had it been diagnosed 2.5 years sooner, he might still be around. F%$k them.

Thanks Dave....your stories are almost identical to the ones on the Fox News special. One of them had cancer and nearly died....just like your father. Glad you didn't lose him. The girl in the story came to the states and it saved her life. Sure our system has problems....why? IMO because of the amount of government interjection already. Insurance companies should be allowed to compete freely, states shouldn't be saying we only allow these insurance companies here.....and I could go on for days about the feds, Medicaid, and Medicare.

 

[MPS]

edit: here's another thing. I've been in Red Deer since 91 and still don't have a family doctor. Why? Because you have to APPLY to become a patient, when they are accepting new patients. Then, after you are deemed acceptable to be a patient, you must book ahead 3 months for any checkups or issues. So I go to the walk-in clinics and hang out with the kids with the clap and the natives waiting for free pills. If you actually get sick....see above for emerg room proceedures. Which, as mentioned, if you go to between 8am and 9pm is full of natives waiting for free pills. F%$k them too.

Wow! This scares the chit out of me too! The system will be overwhelmed.

 

[DaveB]

Thanks Dave....your stories are almost identical to the ones on the Fox News special. One of them had cancer and nearly died....just like your father. Glad you didn't lose him.

Didn't lose him on the drug interaction....lost him to cancer last year though. As I said, by the time they dum-de-dum got around to actually looking for the reasons he was fainting and having seizures instead of just "treating" the seizure with (the wrong) drugs, cancer had spread all over his body and was untreatable.

Pecos' family went through this same scenario with his mother several years earlier. His dad finally had enough and actually drove the both of them down to the Mayo clinic to see what could be done....on his own dime of course. I think they managed to extend her life a while longer, but she too sadly died at far to young an age.

 

[woodzy]

The biggest drain on the system here where I live is the aboriginal people. You can go to our hospital any time day or night and the place is packed with freeloaders. They drink themselves into sickness, don't have jobs, don't pay a dime into the system and seem to always be there.

It will be the exact same thing here. Thing is, our freeloaders aren't limited to the natives.

 

[Beels]

personally I think its time that you quit using our medicare as a punching bag. It may not be perfect, but neither is yours, and I am quite frankly sick of our system which in my opinion isnt all that bad being dragged through the mud because some Americans are pissed off about "socializing" medicare. Come up with some other arguments rather than pointing your fingers across the border and telling us Canadians how crappy we have it, because like I said, its not perfect, but its far better than what some of you make it out to be.

I'm guessing yourself or someone else close hasn't been a victim of it.

If you look worldwide, the percentage of our budget spent on healthcare is out of control compared to the level of care we're receiving. It's broke, needs fixing and you're completely naive to think otherwise. If we're going to pay the tax rates we do, why not receive something better for it?

 

[hypnotoad]

i'll agree with what everyone else has said, our system can really really suck. but if it's an emergency then you do get taken care of pretty fast. would i trade it for the system you have down south, not a chance in the world. but if your goverment can do a proper job with it and structure it more like sweden's or other european countries then it should work out not to bad

 

[Grizzly Adams]

Our medical system has many more problems than we know about.
Most young good doc's flee our fixed rate system and go make more money elsewhere.
Seems like yesterday Texas was advertising for and hosting job fairs for Canadian medical pro's. We currently have a nation wide shortage of accredited doc's.
Fixed annual budgets are causing admins to over spend every year so as to ensure they get their allotment next year. If you don't spend all your allotment you may not get as much next year.
We now already have a public/ private system here. Many people pay and go to the US instead of waiting for months/ years up here. The federal govt has fixed health care costs for the federal govt and left provincial govt's to balance the books. The provincial govt's are running record health care deficit's as a result.
Our system may be good at looking after immediate dire needs but fails at the core levels of care. The costs going forward will only get worse.
Most employed Canadians require some insurance over and above the public coverage to avoid paying user fees of some kind. These are just some of the problems we have up here. Not a good system in my opinion.

 

[AmericanOutlaw]

Canadian health care is equivalent to a busy pub that only has one waitress and one cook.

 

[Transporter]

Never had a problem getting in to see a doctor or going to specialist.One of the biggest problem is people whos kids or themselves get a runny nose and they run to the doctor using up time that could be used for people that are sick.

 

[steveo10]

my biggest problem with our system living in rural ab is that we see different doctors coming and going every week and never get to see the same ones.... they are coming from south africa for a start here and very hard to understand

the perk is we dont have the premium to pay every three months. ($132cdn) most companies you work for or a families have blue cross so medicine cost next to nothing.

our hospital mite be closing even after doubling in size so where is decent size town with many other surrounding, smaller communities gonna go. (45min drive if so)

our system is no means perfect but which one is?

 

[MPS]

Wow this is very interesting....thanks for the inpute Canucks! So if I were to summarize....a lot of you think the acute/urgent care is good, but getting in for a diagnosis/testing/etc is pretty tough? I am hearing that if you are young they put you off because you are supposed to be "healthy." Is this kind of how it works? So what happens if a 25 year old comes in to get tested for diabtetes? Is he on a list for a year?

May your father rest in peace Dave.

 

[Scott]

So Canadians...what do you look at over the fence and say "Hmmmmmmmm, we need that too."


????

 

[Calvin42]

It's all good to be taken care of in an emergency but preventive medicine is equally important. I'll take our system over government run health care ANY DAY!!

 

[AmericanOutlaw]

So Canadians...what do you look at over the fence and say "Hmmmmmmmm, we need that too."


????

Your level of care is far better...if you can afford it.

 

[snowmobiler]

canadian health care has to be better than no health care.