Walk it off

U.S. healthcare has shorter waits

Is that even really true to begin with?

My thought exactly. Specialists are booking months out.
- I'm not from the US but once I was in Orlando and took a friend to the hospital cause she wasn't feeling well, she had insurance. We waited 4 hrs to even see a doctor, I have never waited that long even in public hospitals in my country
- Yep. God help you if you need a specialist because he's likely to respond faster.
- I called my primary for my annual checkup, they can't get me in for 2 months. It's getting bad out there
Compared to European countries, no. Compared to Canada, yes.
- Elective surgery means surgery that can improve quality of life, but is not otherwise life saving right?
  Canada also has the lowest number of doctors per 10k, and the lowest wait for primary care.
  The US has more doctors, but the highest time to primary care.
  I don't know many elective surgeries that can be scheduled without a primary care referring the patient to the surgeon for consult. Not to mention, beside plastic surgery, it's usually a case where the patient has no idea they could benefit from the elective surgery.
  That graph is highly misleading.
- What stands out to me on that chart is that the US is more than twice as bad as any other country when it comes to wait time for primary care appointments.
Not remotely, no. I've been on a wait-list for a few weeks for appointments that are a minimum scheduled 3 months in advance.
It is a common talking point people use when justifying their anti-universal healthcare stance.
It is often paired with refusing to acknowledge the current state of US healthcare and thinking they are paying more for quality and access.
Yeah I have heard many many first hand anecdotes of people needing to schedule appointments months in advance
- True. Even my primary care doctor needs 3 months advance scheduling to find me a slot.
- certain health care facilities. i know for things like medi-caid/care it can be weeks to months in advance to see a specialist. they usually are quite fast in scheudling though. if anyone had kaiser, you can see a doctor quite quickly.
  ALso URGENT care is a thing. i can see that for private practices, or doctors that Are swamped because of short staffing.
It's a very general broad topic. Probably depends a lot on what you need. And more importantly, how rich your are.
I highly doubt Bill Gates have to wait 3 months for a specialist appointment.
From my experience it depends on which health care provider you have. I have Kaiser and some things are pretty quick, some things aren't. I used to be on Covered California aka the ACA and things were a lot slower. Seems like, generally, the more money you pay in premiums the faster service you can get.
- Kaiser
  Maybe it could also be related to the difference between an HMO and normal insurance?
It depends. Do you have a lot of money? I'm sure you can find someone that can see you right away.

Who told you about shorter wait times? Oftentimes you have to wait in months.

US -> Canada here
I hear this often in Canada, but honestly the wait times are similar. In the US it would often take me ~3 months to be able to see my endo. Also, at least you can get healthcare here.
- Aussie here, I just booked to see an endo, wait time was about 10 days
My other favorite refrain was the “You can keep your doctor!” crap that was a big selling point for that crowd.
In this system I have had 4 doctors move practices while under their care because they’re playing the capitalist system. I was not able to benefit from continuity of care in any form.
But at least I had to pay for it, not get it for “free” from a natl healthcare system. Yay.
I can see my primary within hours normally, she can’t do much except refer me to who I really need see and those appointments take weeks to make and months to get to.
- I have a chronic pain issue and my primary referred me to a specialist that took sox months to see. They referred me to a different specialist with a six month wait-list. They then referred me to a more specific sub-specialist for another three month wait. I live in a reasonably well-off and well populated area, so I'm not out in flyover country or anything. I've heard the same from many people. Short wait-lists in America is a myth.
- We desperately need more doctors, and those doctors need to cost less.
  Free college would make a big difference for that.
Seems like a simple enough case that there can be a fact of the matter. Either U.S. wait time are shorter than single payer systems on average or they're not; no need to rely on anecdotal stuff.
Is there anyone that can point to some good data on the subject?
- Honestly? I can't do the searching for you this time, but it's all the top results when you look for average wait times between countries. The data is easy to access. Pretty much all developed nations have similar numbers, with wide variation between specialties.

I accidentally sliced my finger and non stop bleeding in the ER for 5 hours straight.

This was from 2am to 7am. Not exactly peak times.

American healthcare is broken.

No no. It cant be. Everyone in America keeps telling me the wait times in Canada are so high because of socialized medicine and you only have to wait 7 seconds to see a doctor in the glorious US of A.
- I am also Canadian and having used both healthcare system, I want to tell you that your Canadian conservative friends and conservative political talking points are all lying to you. It's far faster in Canada than in America.
  My point of view was from a suburb in Toronto and Vancouver vs NYC and Seattle.
- Am Canadian. Got stung by a wasp on the foot last Saturday. Got worried yesterday when i noticed the red area around the sting grew. Contacted my gp's office at the CLSC, got an appointment to see her this morning, got a scrip for antibiotics since she thinks it's likely an infection, picked it up this pm and starting it tonight. 0$ for the consult, antibiotics are ~60$ (that's the only place my private insurance kicks in, my out of pocket is 12$).
  And this is a very standard experience in Quebec - with 1 caveat: my family's fortunate enough to have an assigned GP, there's a shortage and a pretty long (2y I think) waiting list; on the flip side there are a ton of walking/24/48h appointment clinics (also 0$) for those without.
  When i say 0$, i want to be clear: it's not free, it's part of what's covered by the RAMQ, which is the provincial health insurance company, but our yearly premium for that insurance is at most 800$.
  That's what happens when the health insurance is designed to hedge and amortize social costs rather than generate profits...
- I'm glad you're here to tell the tale. Thanks for sharing.
- It makes my head explode when people say wait times are longer in countries with public systems because all the hypochondriacs will be abusing it.
  It helps that in at least some countries (mine) you need to go to your PCP to even get a referral to a specialist unless you want to go to a private clinic and pay for the specialist. Then also all visits except PCP, are subject to a small fee. I suspect PCPs will stop sending you to specialists if you start raving about a new disease 5 times a month.
  My hypochondriac ex certainly went to the ER about 50-60 times in the 2 years we were together though. Mostly maternity ER (she claimed she started getting braxton-hicks at about 10-12 weeks and the hospital she wanted to give birth at was 100 km from home so it meant 2x100 km drives about 2-3 times a week during starting week 20 or so). I reckon in the US, insurance would've told her to fuck off quite soon and I would've been millions in debt for her bullshit.
Damn I have almost the exact same story. Except mine also comes with a fucked up workers compensation claim and it messed up my credit for years.
I had something similar happen to me like 5 years ago. I chopped part of my finger tip off with a slightly rusty axe while camping after having a few too many.
I went into the ER the next day, waited about the same amount of time as you to be seen to have it checked out and get a tetanus booster. I got a bills from each doctor that happened to walk by, totalling in the realm of $2,000 after insurance. Literally all each did was say, "Ouch, lucky you didn't hit the bone!"
Luckily, my fingertip grew back without nerve damage or anything. I'll probably try to stay up on my shots and get more confident on dressing myself next time, maybe try and make friends with nurses/vet techs. Shit's broken on every level.

When it's free or super low cost, it's paid by the government. This means the government has a vested interest in keeping you healthy so they don't have to pay more. It's a great set up.
- Plus more preventative care. Get something checked out early rather than waiting months and now being treated inpatient.
- Tbf, for profit insurance companies also have a vested interest in keeping you healthy. Healthy people require less care which means more profits.
  It's just that insurance companies also have a vested interest to make sure that they don't pay out for expensive treatments either. You can be healthy and then get cancer which is expensive vs be a sloth whose only form of exercise is walking back and forth from the front door to their bed and has heart issues.
  Edit: judging by the down votes, I suppose it wasn't clear that I'm not trying to defend for profit health insurance. Let's be clear here: single payer is the best way to do healthcare. I was only trying to point out that the incentive to keep your customers healthy is the same regardless of who is paying. The only difference is the motive. One wants to make sure they have money for shareholders while the other wants to make sure they have money for everyone to get care.
What's going on in Sweden?
- High wealth inequality IIRC.
  Which would explain recent pivot to the right. Although that has global factors fueling it that might outweigh anything local.
lmao I had a period of like maybe 5 years when I didn't get a regular checkup when I was a kid because my parents kinda neglected it. I was insured under the family plan too.
Edit: Forgot to add: USA btw
- What are you saying is a flex?
I've never heard the term "fee for service" so I looked it up and I don't think that's exactly what we do in Germany? Physicians are allocated a certain budget per patient (it's not quite as simple but to keep it short) and if they exceed that, it can be somewhat of an issue.
Or maybe I'm just misunderstanding the term. Any experts in German health care around?
- The other issue we may find with these numbers is that they were the latest numbers found by them, but many from 2021. Which I am unsure if doctors visits were altered from average do to COVID infections still being high

The short wait times are a myth.

I went ot the ER with a heart scare in May. Turned out to probably be a panic attack, but they wanted a follow-up with a PCP just in case. The earliest appointment I could get with anyone within 100 miles on my insurance plan was in mid-July, and that wasn't even with a doctor, but a PA.

I went to the appointment, and they spent 5 minutes with me and ordered labs. I go to the lab on the 30th of this month, and have a follow-up with the PA in October.

We're looking at what's essentially a 5 month wait for a diagnosis for an ER visit, and the total bill is gonna be around 15-20 grand.

Fortunately, I have "great insurance" so it's only gonna cost me about $1500 to be told that the tests are inconclusive because they were 3 months after the incident.

U.S. health care is something else. It took me 7 years to be diagnosed with a well-known disease that has a median survival duration of 2.5 years from onset.

I'll leave it to your imagination the obstacles I faced. Frankly, I don't want to think about it.

How much of what you experienced is due to the medical mindset (doctors are morons)?
- I'm not sure exactly what you mean but I would attribute it to four main reasons:
  I'm rural and the quality of physicians here leaves a bit to be desired
  Physicians are overworked and as a result, generally uncaring and unable to provide substantial help.
  It takes months to get the ball rolling on every step of the process
  Insurance is hellbent on denying everything
  My situation didn't improve until I was finally referred to a couple physicians in the right specialty who truly care and were willing to fight my insurance.

Where are the shorter waits?! I called for a primary care appointment in July and only appointment was November or January the next year. FOR A 15-30 MINUTE APPOINTMENT. My insurance was billed $300+ for the visit.

Conservatives bitching about how if we had Canada's healthcare, we'd be waiting forever.
I have AMERICAN healthcare and I have to schedule a basic ass mandatory checkup 4-6 months in advance.
If it was an emergency, the next available slot is six weeks.
- if we had Canada's healthcare, we'd be waiting forever.
  Or another approach, calculate how much time it takes to save the cash for any given procedure and compare that to any socialized care. Say for an MRI, lab work, root canal, etc.
  USA system is great if your wealthy. Otherwise you might as well be in a developing country as far as your access to all these high tech treatments we need massive profits on.
- As a Canadian the last time that I had to go to the ER I was in and out in 2 hours and it cost me nothing out of pocket.
  Now when it comes to procedures themselves oh there's a bit of a wait. But generally if it's serious you get bumped ahead cuz we use triage rules for most things.
Sounds like it's time to find a new primary doctor, that's insane.
- This is the new doctor 😭😭.
  I called another place and they actually said to call back in a couple months. The healthcare system is so consolidated in my state that there's only a few systems to go to. Maine.
  I could schedule something hours away but then I'd need to take time off work to go or I won't go because of the inconvenience
Same... to get an appointment at my PCP in a decently sized city it was 7 months.
My insurance was billed $300+ for the visit.
Rest assured, they didn't pay $300+. Of course if you'd paid for it out of pocket without negotiating, YOU would've paid $300+.
That's part of why the prices are so goddamn high. EMR and billing software for the US market gets a "billed" and "expected" field on charges and the "expected" value in particular differs by insurance I believe.

Shorter wait lmao

I've been waiting for almost a year to see a specialist for my depression

I have health insurance and my parents have money to pay for it, just that we aren't rich enough to skip the line

Have you ever considered that depression is a appropriate reaction to the world around you?

Shorter wait times? The US healthcare system is a massive fucking dumpster fire. There are cases of people dying in hospital waiting rooms.

Probably if you're a millionaire you can get shorter wait times.
The rest of y'all are fucked tho. Wish it wasn't so, but oh well.
- You can get shorter wait times in any other health care system too by using a private doctor. At least I don't know a country where private doctors are illegal.

Does american healthcare really have shorter wait times? I've seen a lot of people waiting and done a lot of waiting myself.

Is there any data?

While it may depend on what country you want to compare it to there is nothing about privatization that inherently reduces wait times. My experience is that after leaving the US my wait times are equivalent or improved.
Private insurance just means you wait, it costs a lot more, and you're way more likely to delay treatment of your own accord because the profit motive makes the system a financial terror and a psychological torment.
- its also propagandized, designed to make people wait, because the insurance would rather you pay for insurance and not use its services at all, because thats costs them money each time. hence thats why they raise rates for OLDER people(55+), to price them out of the system, and you hare the shitty ones like UHC/UHG, or blue shield deny drugs or procedures all the time.
- Sounds right to me.
if i had to pay for healthcare i better not be fucking waiting.
- I probably don't need to tell you this, but don't visit the US.
it depends on the insurance, and the providers, kaiser has pretty fast appointments, by usually caters to the west coast, and its pretty expensive hmo plan. some i heard can be weeks or months, depending on where too.
Depends on the procedure. Orthopedic surgery in the USA is pretty fast to get. Getting an MRI approved when compared to, say Japan, takes forever.

I feel like the result from this image today would be to cut off the wings and make the fuselage weaker to make it cheaper to produce, because clearly they aren't needed.
- You forgot to give yourself a bonus after "contributing value" to the company.
This image is just an english Kanji at this point.

Isn't that exactly the point that's being made against a public health care system? At least that's how I always understood it. "If everyone had access, I would have longer wait times" is exactly what I heard so often when I talked with Americans about the public health care system.

I think you found a feature, not a bug.

Yeah, with conservatives here in the US the "quiet parts" often include something about it being preferable for other people to suffer or die than for me to lose some convenience. They just keep getting louder and louder about it.

I work for a big healthcare provider and in spite this likely being true, I still hear all the time about trying to "reduce over utilization". It's disgusting.

and probably qoutas for DENIALS, over approvals for certain situations. i know one drug, dupixent is often denied by insurance, because its super expensive.
Is "healthcare provider" an actual provider of healthcare (hospital, private practice, etc) or a middleman?
Hospitals clearly want to have as many procedures as they can. Insurers likewise want to pay for none. Hence "overutilization".
Any way it is, companies gonna chase profit with no eye for people. Remember, they don't exist for people. They do for money.
- Oh it's definitely a middleman regardless of what they call themselves.

I could 100% believe it. This not based on any study, but it would make aense more americans practice home remedies when ill rather than go to a doctor. Like feeling sick? If you dont need a doctors note just rest, stay hydrated. The rule of thumb is if it lasts more then 14 days see a doctor. Sprain a muscle, joint or break a bone, if its not a compound break (Bone out of skin) you can usually get away with just putting it in a splint yourself. We own multiple braces and crutches for that.

So yeah, alot of Americans I think they dont think of calling emergency services or seeing a doctor when they are ill or injured, only if its like workers comp, car accident or gets bad enough (aforementioned 14 days cough).

It pairs with the you dont stop going to work even if you feel sick,

if it lasts more then 14 days see a doctor
That... seems like a long time? Is that what your doctors are recommending for medical reasons or is it born out of necessity because of the general circumstances in the US? Because where I am, it's 3 days, a week at most.
- For (possibly) broken bones, it's zero days here. Straight to the doctor you go. A three day cough will have to be pretty damned serious before you get to see a doctor though.
- that is a rule for certain conditions, like mouth ulcers, if it last more than 2 weeks, probably should seek a doctor asap. i had one that lasted that long. because acute causes dont last that long, and thats usually only 1-2 things that can make it last longer than 2 weeks.
I've done a really poor job of stitching myself up with bleach soaked fishing line.
Couldn't afford a doctor when I had a severe concussion.
When I broke a toe I tapped the broken toe to the toe next to it and took the laces off of that shoe so my foot would fit.
When I had swine flu and my fever was dangerously high I slept outside because it was 40F outside.
Hell even when I was in the US Army I barely used the free healthcare. Both because of the anxiety of years of healthcare being unaffordable, and my leadership discouraging anyone to use it. You didn't want to get labeled a "broke dick" as you would get treated like shit.
I was denied medical care quite a bit as a child and I’m broke/uninsured now so I’ve learned how to take care of a few things. I figured how how to lance things with a lighter and a safety pin in middle school. I’ve found that local doctors don’t really know shit about how to deal with my trans body, and will blame testosterone for everything, so it’s mostly been a waste of time and money to see doctors.
I do have to get blood work twice a year for my testosterone, which is expensive and difficult to cope with but probably good for me in the long run.

I’ve been on a waitlist for my GI for more than a year ( I’m in the US)

Sorta makes some sense. People wait until it’s critical and then get rushed in with a heart attack, or they go to walk-in clinics which are a growing trend - a major downside is you don’t have a regular doctor that knows you health trends and can keep up a plan for you. Walk-ins start you from scratch every time. Getting to see your PCP, if you have one? Months for an appointment. Tell them it’s important? Couple weeks. Really important? Tomorrow or go to the ER.

There are no shorter wait times in the US. Lol

Why do you think healthcare is tied to employment?

They only want to help if they can get a return on their investment. That's all we are to them.

That's all we've ever been.
The problem is that there's a hell of a lot more of us than there are of them.
If we could only use our collective power to change things to favour all workers instead of the owners and elites.... If only there was some way to regulate them into compliance to provide better, safer, and fairer, working conditions... To add some layer of oversight, where dozens of people that represent the majority of people across the nation to help bring forward what the people want, instead of the 1% just doing whatever the fuck they want....
That would be amazing. If only it existed...

There is no such thing as US healthcare

We have "plans" you can get through your employer which will bring down your cancer operation costs to just $15000 in deductibles, assuming you don't get fired for taking the time off to get the operation.
Otherwise, if you fall on a iron fence you can go to the ER ~~and at least the bill won't impact your credit history.~~ Sorry I'm being told that now medical bills impact your credit history.
- What a dystopian world you people live in...

yup in and out

Dead no doubt.

~~Why does he look kinda hot though~~

Bingo