A mom with a rare brain tumour has successfully undergone surgery that wasn’t available in Quebec, despite the province’s health insurance board denying her coverage.

  • WbrJr@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    5
    arrow-down
    6
    ·
    10 months ago

    Is the Canadian healthcare so bad you rather go to the us?! I saw memes about bad healthcare in Canada but don’t know any facts or talked to anyone about it yet

    • sbv@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      27
      ·
      edit-2
      10 months ago

      Quebec doesn’t have expertise with the type of tumor she had:

      Harding-Jones lived with an extremely rare brain tumour called a colloid cyst, one that neurosurgeons in Quebec admittedly don’t have the expertise to operate on, patient files show.

      … an ultra-specialized brain operation to remove the tumour that is only available in New York’s Weill Cornell Medicine Brain and Spine Centre.

      Canada doesn’t have the population density of the US. If a condition is exceedingly rare, patients occasionally need to go to elsewhere to find specialists.

      I suspect Americans in less populous states would be in the same boat.

      • Vqhm@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        10 months ago

        Yea not everywhere is equipped to do all types of operations.

        Shit, in America I know someone that just wants a blood work type test done in the largest city in the State. Can’t even find anyone that knows shit all about the test. Several doctors refused to draw the blood and send it out of state. Test can be done at Johns Hopkins (or other 1st rate places around the globe) but hasn’t trickled down to 50 states yet. Doctors stay in their lane and if you want a specialist at the cutting edge you’ll have to travel even in America.

    • AlternateRoute@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      26
      ·
      10 months ago

      In Canada if you are physically injured or have a baby you go to the hospital, get care and go home. No worries of bankruptcy.

      If you have a non urgent / long term condition you spend years waiting to see someone.

      On the whole I still think it is a better system than the US but it really does have problems.

      People opt not to get treated or take ambulance in the states due to the costs. Even if you have coverage from work you may only have coverage at specific hospitals for some treatments.

    • bbbhltz@beehaw.org
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      10 months ago

      It varies by province and there are definite shortcomings. It is actually pretty shameful that we brag about it. As other users have noted, the wait times are ridiculous, there is also a shortage of GPs in many areas…

      • my mother has not seen her GP face-to-face since December 2019; the lady up and took off to another part of Canada! No doctor came to replace her so she handles things remotely.
      • my mother once also had a test and the doctors said, “this is probably cancer, you need a biopsy” the next appointment was 9 months later. She managed to get in 6 months later by calling every day. The results came back and it was indeed uterine or ovarian (can’t remember) cancer that had spread and developed into lymphoma. Nthey asked her, “ma’am, why didn’t you come sooner!?” Now, once the diagnosis was made it was a different story. She was treated and had multiple operations and chemo and radiotherapy and is now fine.
      • I was misdiagnosed with a disease and found out 16 years later that I absolutely didn’t have that disease (luckily there was no treatment, just minor lifestyle changes)
      • getting into a walk-in clinic can be literal hell and if you don’t have a car you are just plain screwed.

      Those are just anecdotes from Nova Scotia, though.

      Is it bad enough to go to the US? If you have some money and don’t want to wait, that is what lots of people do. Just get it taken care of, nip it in the bud instead of waiting and worrying.

      • WbrJr@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        10 months ago

        I am sorry to hear that. I hope she is fine now! It sounds like system is just overwhelmed, because it would be a lot cheaper and faster and easier to help people like your mom right away and not half a year later when the disease got worse…

    • m-p{3}@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      10 months ago

      It’s decent when it’s serious enough, but the worst case will obviously end up in the news.

      There’s almost bo clinics you can visit without an appointment, so you need to call a hotline (8-1-1) to talk to someone who will ask some questions about your current medical condition and try to book you an appointment to the nearest clinic. Be ready to wait at the ER for a long time if you’re not a priority at the triage, but I’d rather wait than paying a fortune when I can’t see anyone else because all the clinics are full and you don’t have a family doctor.

      • pbjamm@beehaw.org
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        ·
        10 months ago

        Be ready to wait at the ER for a long time if you’re not a priority at the triage, but I’d rather wait than paying a fortune when I can’t see anyone else because all the clinics are full and you don’t have a family doctor.

        All of that is true in the US too unless you have amazing (expensive) insurance or just pockets overflowing with money. It can take months to get an appointment with your Primary Care Physician so if you need to see someone sooner than that you can prob in to see a nurse sooner, or go to the Urgent Care. Either way you are paying Co-Pay (for me it was us$35) plus for your prescription. ER is very likely to be full of people who are injured or uninsured so have no other option. In the later case they have likely been putting off a visit to a DR for that very reason and are now desperate.