Wait, I Thought X-rays Were Expensive?

A year ago I was fortunate enough to study abroad in London - a city with afternoon teas galore, posh neighborhoods, and plenty of pubs. Upon spending the long weekend in Dublin for St. Patrick’s Day, my best friend and roommate Bridget, unfortunately injured her wrist BIG TIME.

We took our flight back to London on Sunday and Bridget and I rushed to urgent care late that night. She arrived at St. Mary’s Paddington, a public hospital in London. The front desk asked for her name, address, and what was wrong with her. Four hours later, at 2 o’clock in the morning, she was finally looked at by a nurse.

Once the nurse took x-rays, it was another two hours until Bridget was finally looked at by a doctor. Even once the doctor examined her x-rays they were not exactly sure what was wrong with her and seemed unqualified, so she was forced to wait an even longer time for a more experience doctor to take a look at the results from her x-ray.

After all of this waiting time, the doctor told Bridget she had a sprained wrist. She was put in a sling and the doctor gave little advice on how to treat the injury. We were then sent on our way in the early hours of a Monday morning.

Bridget and I learned a few things from her experience. The first was that the UK has both public and private hospitals. Public hospitals, like the one we went to are much busier than private ones. We also learned that in the UK public hospitals are free. Bridget was never charged anything for her visit, however her wait time was still pretty hefty. We also found out that at night time, these public hospitals have very few people on staff. There were only two doctors available at urgent care that night.

I thought it was really amazing that a country provided free health care opportunities, as well as paid options. This gave the opportunity for people that could not afford great healthcare to still be treated on, and honestly the wait time at the public hospital was as long as wait times I’ve experienced in emergency rooms in the United States. Although it is true the quality of the urgent care and the experience of the doctors was not up to par with experiences I’ve had in hospitals in the United States or probably the experience we would have had at a private hospital it was still pretty impressive.

The American healthcare system has continued to remain a topic of interest in our government and our politics. I believe we could learn a pointer or two from our European counterparts.

#London #abroad #sprainedwrist