I understand what you’re driving at - it’s not actually “free health care”, but how do you plan to determine what portion of his tax burden goes towards health care as opposed to nice red Mountie uniforms?
How hot is it in Saskatchewan this time of year?
StG
In our Federal tax form books is a pie chart of where the money the government spends comes from and where it goes - Social Security, medicare and other retirement - 36%, defense - 24%, social programs - 25%, etc. That doesn’t break it down exactly, but gives you an idea. Does the Canadian government do the same thing?
I agree that it can’t be considered $0 unless you take into consideration the amount you pay for the benefit.
StG
The only time I have been to the hospital lately was to give birth, so that is its own separate thing, but I did take my kids to the doctor this morning.
My eleven month old son has chronic earaches, and since we are taking him on a plane soon I wanted to make sure he didn’t have any infection. To make an appointment with his doctor I would need to book about a week in advance, but his doctor is quite chatty and always running really late. My way to get around that is to get there first thing and go on the drop-in list. I did that this morning and saw the doctor in less than 30 minutes. I tagged my daughter in on the appointment as well and she got a general check up done.
I was in and out of the doctors in 45 minutes.
I have coverage for the prescription, so my only cost was a coffee for me and a treat for my daughter.
Thanks for the answers, Canadopers!
Health care spending is a provincial thing, not federal. The Province of Saskatchewan is spending somewhere in the vicinity of $4.5 billion on health care this year. (cite - see pg. 85) That comes to approximately $4300 per resident. Since this money doesn’t come from a poll tax, how much any given person pays for health care depends on their income, their spending habits, their capital gains, etc.
I signed on for a young family doctor, wanting one who will not retire on me.
At the first appointment the receptionist advised me of the office policy of patients arriving fifteen minutes early, so I countered with my policy of arriving at the scheduled time. Unfortunately, fisticuffs did not ensue because the doctor wanted to get on with the appointment.
The appointment was thorough and lengthy, and led to a stool sample test that got lost in the mail strike (if any of you receive my poop in an envelope, just re-address it to Deepak Chopra, President, Canada Post Corporation, Ottawa, Ontario), and to my first prostate exam.
I thought that her having small fingers would be a good thing, and at first it was, but in a quest for thoroughness, she she poked about up there with not just a finger, but a whole hand, and then her other hand, and then her foot, which got stuck, which was not the highpoint of her day. Since then, l have tested the public bdsm waters, so I figure that I came out of the first appointment in better shape than the doctor.
I continue to attend every six months, and I have never had to wait. She keeps enough time open in her schedule to.be availabe when needed, as opposed to.days later, and other doctors cover for her when she is out of town visiting remote communities. Medically competent and acting on a social conscience is a terrific combination.
She also provides fresh opinions concerning treatments from specialist doctors, including the Lord High Mucki-muck of internal medicine in the region, who happened to be her prof in med school.
The internal medicine fellow took me on when a driver’s licence physical determined that I have diabetes. Peeing in a bottle led to a blood test that resulted in a phone call from the hospital telling me to drop what I was doing and get to the eergency dept. That was a bit of a WTF moment, seeing as I felt fine. One of the.guys with whom I paddle (ww kayaking oh yee of dirty minds) referred me to the specialist, who now has my n
numbers down so far that I became a year younger in the last year, and have the diabetes under control. At my most recent apppontment we talked about boners, but I didn’t mention the foot up the butt episode. There are never any waits at his office either. That’s not bad – how many people can you walk up to and talk about boners without having to wait?
He has me seeing an eye doctor a couple of times a year. Thanks to the efforts of my GP and the specialist, my eye doctor has been able to confirm that I can see him as well today as I did at my first visit. We’ve never discussed what I look at, which I suppose is just as well. As with the other doctors, there is never a wait.
The only other doctor whom I regularly see is an orthopaedic surgeon. A femoral nerve pinch atrophied my quads on one leg, but the good doctor got me walking again, and has continued to work with me to get me back to full mobilt
mobility and moderate strength, fortunately without an operation. One of the things I have learned along the way is that I nod off relaxing to the MRI’s rhythm (I have fresh MRI done prior to each visit, and each time I fall asleep inside the machine). I’ve never had to wait for an MRI, but I usually have to wait when visiting the orthopaedic fellow, for the appointments are in the evening, by which time he often is running behind schedule. He’s very chatty, and we have both been involved in a local annual ironman race, so usually he ends up running even more late after my visit. Since one of the problems is stenosis, which will worsen over time, it’s good to have him monitoring it.
Add to the mix various and sundry visits to the emergency department to get patched up (ranging from stitches to knee operations), and I have to say that I have been getting my money’s worth. How much money for many doctor and hospital visits? Nothing. Zip. Nadda. Any shortcuts taken in the treatments. None. Nothing but the best treatmant.
But what about the fine print? I have had to pay for my diabetes m
medications and some physiotherapy. I would like to have our universal health care extended to cover out-of-hospital medications, more physio, and out-of-hospital dental.
As far as how this affects my taxes, have a look a the World Health Organization statistics that compare nations on lifespan, level of health, per capita personal health spending, per capita government spending, proportion of GDP, etc. I’m posting from a.blackbery, so if you need a link to the stats, just search the SDMB for “World Health Organization” posts made by me. Universal health care really is less expensive while resulting in better health.
I’m American. I had a cyst on my butt. I was driving from Sarasota to Key West and it became inflamed and really painful. I stopped at a urgent care clinic in Marathon and had it drained, got some pain meds and it cost about $100.
Several years later, I get another cyst on my butt. I go and see the doctor. He says, ah, what’s your problem? Don’t worry about it. So, apparently he won’t do anything about it. It starts growing to about the size of a golf ball. I go in and he says, what’s your problem, it’s just a cyst.
I say, “Well it’s rather disturbing, kind of uncomfortable, and it the miniscule chance I get laid, it’s really embarrassing.” So, I have to have general anesthesia and it costs $1800 out of pocket because I have very expensive but basically catastrophic incident health insurance even though I’m actually reasonably healthy. Fucker, I probably could have gotten the thing removed when it was the size of a pea with a local but that asshole wouldn’t deal with it. Fuck, next time I’ll drive down to Mexico and have them remove it. I mean seriously, would that old fart of a doctor not get a fucking golf ball size cyst removed from his butt?
Sebaceous cysts are not usually drainable in this way, as they tend to have their own wall internally which just seals up and refills at a later date. I have one now I’d like to get rid of (have had several removed previously).
Muffin - That all sounds pretty good, but if being Canadian means your posts keep dropping in the middle, I think I’ll stay American. 
StG
Sorry, I am very bad at using a BlackBerry touch screen. That’s one piece of Canadian tech that needs improving.
me too! It’s a great idea for a thread–but I have a sugestion for the OP:
add one extra line to your running summary of waiting times, costs, etc.
The extra line should be “treatment received”.
Listing Treatment Time of, say 20 minutes, and Cost of Zero is impressive. But it makes a difference if the 20 minutes were spent just talking to the doc, or ,say, getting minor surgery performed by him and an assistant.
I intend to keep following this thread, and compare the OP’s medical system to mine.And listing "treatment received " in 5 or 6 words would make it easier to keep track of the process.
Sure, I could scroll back and re-read each post, but it’s easier just to glance at the summary of each one
Hi, all,
Well, a development. Over the weekend, the bump got steadily sorer, so I assume it was the infection, as Dr M warned might happen. On Sunday, I dug out the prescription and dropped it off at the local pharmacy while I ran some errands, then went back and picked it up.
The pharmacist took a few minutes to run through it with me: Keflex, an antibiotic, four times a day, no allergies, right? Since Keflex is a listed drug on the Sask Pharmaceuticals list, it’s covered by my drug plan at work, which picks up the entire cost.
We used to go to Shoppers Drugs, a big pharmacy chain here in Canada. Shoppers was very convenient, in the same mall as Dr M’s clinic, but very impersonal. They made a mistake in one prescription a while ago, took a long time to fill them, and so on - a volume business.
About a year ago, we switched to our current pharmacy - it’s a small independent, about 15 minutes away from the doctors’ clinic, so not quite as convenient. However, they give much more personal attention - to the point of remembering our first names when we come in, and taking a lot more time to ask what the prescription is for, to explain it, and so on. In fact, a while ago one of the pharmacists helped us get one of our unlisted prescriptions onto the SaskPharma approved list, and therefore full pay by our work drug plan. Much better service all around - and since the doc normally sends the prescription electronically, it’s usually just one trip, to pick up the prescription once it’s filled.
And, since this pharmacy is also in a strip mall, no parking fees!
July 22: Had the Prescription Filled
Wait Time: 18 days.
Waiting Room Time: 30 minutes.
Treatment Received and Times: Initial consult with GP (10 minutes); drug info from pharmacist (5 minutes)
Treatment Time (Total): 15 minutes
Medical Fees & Co-Pays: 0 dollars.
Prescription and OTC Costs and Co-pays: 0 dollars
Parking and other incidental costs: 0 dollars.
I’ll PM you immediately if it pops! Even before I let Mrs Piper know!
Well, yes, that’s sort of the point…
Good idea - done! I’ll list the treatment rec’d and the time for each in parentheses on one line, with a running total of all treatment time on another line.
With respect to the question about taxes, I’ve got a few comments.
First, it’s very difficult to allocate and say how much of the treatment I receive comes from my taxes. For instance, I’m pretty sure that the office visit to Dr M would be a lot cheaper than an ER trip, even if I spent the same amount of time with a doctor, because the costs of running an ER are much higher than the cost of a clinic. And then, my taxes help with capital costs for new hospitals (Sask is building a new Children’s Hospital soon, and has announced a new day-surgery hospital) as well as capital costs for existing facilities. And then there’s the fact that Mrs Piper and I have the PiperCub, who doesn’t pay any taxes, and yet gets the same health care - how do we allocate that? and if we had more kids, but paid the same taxes, does that mean that we’re getting a deal on doctor visits compared to a single adult? So you can’t just take my tax bill and say “This is how much I pay for health care.”
And then there’s the fact that our taxes are fixed, regardless of whether we ever use the health care system in a given year - unlike say gas taxes, which we can avoid by not driving our car as much, and thus avoid contributing to road upkeep. Some years, if we use the health care system a lot, we may be getting more bang for our buck than in other years when we don’t have a need to use it, if you try to allocate taxes to particular services received.
But there’s also a question of perspective - we pay for a variety of services by our taxes; we don’t normally try to allocate them to a particular service received; why should we do that for health care? As I and some other posters stated in that thread I linked to in my OP, for me, health care is just another type of government service, like roads, police, fire, water, gas, electricity, and so on. When someone asks me how much my car costs per year, I just add up my out-of-pocket costs (loan, licence fees, insurance, gas, etc.). I don’t try and figure out what proportion of my municipal and provincial taxes go to support the roads that I drive on, even though those roads are essential to me being able to drive. I know the roads aren’t free; we all pay for them with our taxes; but I don’t see the point of trying to allocate. It’s simply a service I get for my taxes; and health care is no different.
Finally, as it’s been pointed out many times in these threads, another way to look at the cost is to consider health care costs as a proportion of GDP - and here, Canadian governments spend less of our GDP on health care than does the US, arguably with better results. So it’s simply not very easy to allocate directly between taxes paid and public health services received.