Is There a Doctor in the House?

Yesterday, I had to go to the doctor’s to get my medications refilled. I’ve heard so much negativity about socialized medicine in the United States, and how it would be the ultimate end-all to civilization as we Americans knew it if we switched over to something like “what England has.” I’m going to rain on somebody’s parade because it was an eye-opening experience in the positive, with respect to my less than enthusiastic experiences with doctors, clinics, hospitals and the lot in the United States.

Steve, one of my homestay hosts took me to the East Oxford Health Center on Cowley Road at around noon. I was nervous because I’d imagined I’d be weeding my way through an enormous bureaucracy that would have me waiting for days, if not weeks for appointments. I had nightmarish visions of being without my medications and having to plead my case to some kind of panel or board. I thought I might be treated rudely because I was an American. All my thoughts and fears were unfounded. The Jenners complex is a modern structure housing three (clean) clinics and I had to go to the clinic that Jennifer, my other homestay host goes to. At 12:30 p.m., I received an appointment card for a 5:15 p.m. appointment, later that afternoon. I had to fill out a very brief information sheet, and that was that.

I arrived a little early for my appointment because I thought I might have to fill out more paperwork (in America, the paperwork is notoriously lengthy). However, the clerk told me that all I needed to do was to have a seat, and look for my name to appear on the screen at the front of the room. At 4:45, I was called into Room 8 down the hall, behind the closed door. Actually, I heard a beep from where the screen was, and saw my name and the room number flashing. How utterly efficient! I’m used to waiting for anything that is healthcare-related in the United States, so I figured I’d be put into a room and be tasked to do just that. When I arrived at Room 8, the doctor – Dr. Thompson – was already there.

Dr. Thompson questioned me with respect to the particular medications I needed, and I gave him the background information, while he entered everything into the computer. No notes to be transcribed, no huge stacks and files to put away. He typed in my information and was very understanding of my medical needs, and when he was uncertain about something, he went down the hall to consult with another doctor. He talked to me and made eye contact, and we conversed briefly. After about 20 minutes, the visit was over, and Dr. Thompson brought me electronically printed prescriptions and told me to make an appointment in two weeks.

I went back out, got in a short line, and paid £37 for the doctor’s visit. The clerk was most helpful and also very kind. She booked my next appointment and instructed me to take the prescriptions to the pharmacy, which was just across the clinic’s walkway. The prescriptions took about 15 minutes to fill because there were a few people before me. It was nothing like I’d ever seen before. Behind a glass panel are stacks and stacks of different medications (like 1½ stories’ worth), and on the side was a chute from which the medications were dropped down electronically. I think there were people working behind the very tall display. I paid £24 for four medications, three of which I have to go back to see the doctor for. The fourth one was just an inhaler.

Steve told me that if a person is unable to get to the clinic to see a doctor – such as with a severe virus where it’s impossible to go out, the doctors will make house calls. Of course, there’s a fee, but it is not exorbitant. This is what I believe healthcare is and can be in the United States if we stopped worrying about the possibility that if we allow people who can’t afford expensive doctors and insurance, they’ll mooch off the system and have no motivation to work or contribute to society. There are always those who will take and not give back, but I contend that most decent people want to make something of their lives and more simply, want to live. People have pride and aspirations and to discredit the human spirit as being incapable of receiving without giving is criminal, considering the number of illnesses that have to go unattended, and deaths that occur as a result of the lack of good and egalitarian healthcare privileges in the richest nation in the world. Taxation without representation may be criminal, but taxation with life in mind is far better than the mechanism we have in place now that takes more money out of our pockets than if we’d paid nearly half of our wages into systems that worked.

I’m sure there is a side of socialized medicine that I have yet to explore, because there are people who complain about the healthcare system here. Certain expenses are going up in the UK due to pharmaceutical strongholds, and people no longer have automatic dental care which has gone the way of the private sector. So I’ll try to put together a more well-rounded synopsis of healthcare in the UK (I have plenty of information and experience about healthcare in the United States). There are two sides to any coin, and I’ve presented the more Polyannaish side to the UK healthcare system. At least there is something by which I can measure the United States’ healthcare system, and then work the rest of my life to craft a hybrid of the two systems from that exceeds everybody’s expectations. This, alongside reforming our mental health system, is my cause. If I’m not busy doing that, I’ll teach. For now, I’m not really insured, and I don’t go to doctors because I dislike them – at my peril. The doctor I do go to costs me over $100 per visit, and I can’t afford some of the medications I take, so samples keep me supplied for the time-being, probably until I am sufficiently addicted to whatever drug I need but will not be able to afford… Who gave the pharmaceutical companies so much power in the first place? And here I thought we were conducting a war on drugs in the United States…