Close encounter with socialized medicineBy Bruce Dancis
Special to The Bee
Published: Saturday, Jun. 26, 2010 - 12:00 am
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A blustery London breeze knocked a large wooden plank loose from a construction site and into a heavy steel barrier, which in turn fell over and hit me on the right side of my head, sending me crashing into the stone wall of a British government building.
At least that's what the onlookers who witnessed the incident and pulled the barrier off me said as I lay on the ground, bleeding from head and knee on King Charles Street, only a block from 10 Downing Street and just outside a museum honoring Winston Churchill and his World War II Cabinet.
Still conscious but a little bit woozy, I hadn't yet realized I was about to have a close encounter with the National Health Service, a.k.a. the United Kingdom's form of socialized medicine.
My wife, Karen, and I were in London on vacation, visiting the usual tourist attractions, including the Cabinet war rooms where Churchill and his advisers gallantly organized the defense of their country against Adolf Hitler's rampaging armed forces. Getting injured in a freak accident on a Saturday afternoon was not part of our vacation agenda.
I kept telling my worried wife and the gathering crowd that I was OK, despite all that blood. Another tourist, a doctor from Florida, assisted Karen in applying facial tissues to the gash in my head.
He began asking me questions: "Who is the prime minister?"
Before I could answer "David Cameron," he realized I was an American and changed the question to, "Who is the president of the United States?" adding, "Not that you have to like him."
"But I do," I replied, "for the most part."
The good doctor was trying to find out how badly injured I was, and when he could see that I hadn't lost either consciousness or most of my blood and marbles, he jokingly informed me, "I am indeed a doctor, but I'm a gynecologist." He said I probably needed to go to the hospital, but warned – with an unstated but obviously negative attitude toward what the Brits call the NHS – "you'll most likely be there for seven hours (before they get to you)."
My wife wrote down the names and phone numbers of the doctor and a few other witnesses, and then I walked on my own power down to the museum. A museum staffer with a first aid kit provided clean gauze pads to take the place of the bloody tissues I was pressing against my head. Since we were close to St. Thomas Hospital, just on the other side of the Thames River across Westminster Bridge, he quickly hailed a cab and within five minutes my wife and I walked into the emergency room.
Although there were about a half dozen people already sitting in the waiting room, I was almost immediately ushered over to a triage table where a nurse examined my wounds and asked me what had happened. Determining that the bleeding from my scalp had stopped and that I was not in life-threatening danger, he turned me over to an intake clerk, who took down a more detailed account of the accident. Ten minutes later, I was seen by another nurse, who examined me more fully before passing me along to another room, where yet another nurse placed me and my wife in a curtained-off space.
Within 15 minutes, a doctor came by. He asked me to describe what had occurred. I recounted what happened, with my wife filling in some details. I said I also had a mild headache. He gave me a rather complete neurological exam, testing my eye movement, reflexes, et al., and looking at the bump on one side of my head, the laceration on the other and the abrasions on my knee. He then had a nurse join us, who cleaned up my wounds and, in lieu of stitches, applied some medicinal glue to my scalp. The doctor said I most likely also had a mild concussion. He didn't think it was anything serious, but advised me to immediately return to the hospital should the headache get significantly worse or if I experienced any vomiting.
The doctor thought I wouldn't have any problem attending the Richard Thompson concert that evening for which we already had tickets. He then said I could leave.
My wife and I walked out of the hospital and took a stroll along the nearby south bank of the Thames. Except for a slight headache, I felt fine. And Richard Thompson was great, as always.
To summarize my NHS experience:
Total time spent in the hospital: 50 minutes.
Number of nurses and doctors who examined me: four.
Number of times I was asked my nationality: zero.
Number of times I was asked to show proof of health insurance: zero.
Number of times I was asked how I expected to pay the hospital bill: zero.
Hospital bill: zero pounds.
Value of Britain's National Health Service, a.k.a. socialized medicine, when you have a medical emergency: priceless.
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More:
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/06/26/2850249/close-encounter-with-socialized.html#ixzz0ryVfHBqGTell me again about American Exceptionalism???
:shrug: