Not The Way We Treat Our None Paying Medical Tourists?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5407935/Man-39-died-kidney-failure-Egypt-holiday.html

[anthro-nerd]

If we expect tourists to have medical insurance when travelling, then it's not difficult to practice what we preach. There's no doubt that his insurance would have asked for his previous medical history.

[mikey4444]

Like Sqad and others, I think there is more to this than meets the eye.

[Peter Pedant]

// I don't believe that the report is a true representation of events.//

the only one I met who presented with completely failed kidneys 'just like that' had covered up his long history of chronic renal failure ....

I note that someone was not frank with the insurance company ( peritonitis two years earlier is pretty hard to forget ) and had it voided - this is NOT a technicality. I know I am uninsurable as a result of a pretty terrible medical history and wouldnt dream of trying - "oo I forgot I had ca colon - silly me o never mind" because everyone knows if you lie on an insurance form they wont pay.

There are govt hospitals - I am not sure if they offer dialysis.

[Sqad]

Acute renal failure on holiday with no pre existing cause?...probably due to dehydration.....probably/Bit odd?
In the notes he had a cardiac arrest....why?
Could it be that the dialysis was switched off due solely to medical reasons ( he would have been a vegetable) and nothing to do with insurance or payments.

There comes a time in medicine whether State or Private funding where a "body" becomes salvageable and life support is meaningless and needs to be discontinued.
It is my impression that the unknown facts of this case are the important details and not the financial aspects.

[naomi24]

sqad/Mikey, it happens. I've seen it happen. Some places aren't quite as big on altruism as we are - and in those places life is cheap.

[youngmafbog]

OG, I told you the cost, circa £300 for med notes/questionnaire and an examination fro an Insurance company. (Note: you can see your own for free if you have forgotten anything)

Do you want to add that to everyones £80.00 annual policy? I dont think you will have many friends left if you say yes !!

[Sqad]

naomi....."Ive seen it happen" just isn't good enough, I don't disbelieve you but i would need the medical details before i accept that doctors and hospitals would let people die on purely financial grounds.

[naomi24]

sqad, //I don't disbelieve you //

Clearly you do disbelieve me .... but hey ho.

[mikey4444]

Naomi...for the record, I don't believe you either !

[naomi24]

Mikey, I don't tell lies.

[mikey4444]

Naomi...I haven't accused you of lying, but I still don't think that what you say can have happened in this case...interpret that any way you like.

[kvalidir]

I am not going to call you a liar. I'm sure you saw someone die Naomi and it must have been awful, but what some are suggesting is that was possibly not ONLY because there was a problem with payment but also that it was a medical decision which might have come anyway even if they could pay.

[naomi24]

kvalidir, thank you, but I know what I’m talking about. The man in question was taken to hospital by ambulance where the medical staff refused to touch him without seeing his insurance papers. He died.

[naomi24]

Mikey, you don't believe the people in the report either. Maybe that says more about you than it says about me or them. No need for you to interpret that, I'm sure.

[kvalidir]

That is truly dreadful Naomi, I'm so sorry :(

[Sqad]

In an emergency....ALL hospitals will treat patients, but in a non emergency,then Private hospitals have the option of not treating the patient who is not insured.
In this case.....I assume....as i do not have the facts...the case was not considered an emergency, missed diagnosis and the patient died.
It happens all over the world, including the NHS........but again, i am not in possesion of the facts of this case.
Patients die, misdiagnosis happens, mistakes are made...all over the world, every day.

[anotheoldgit]

ummmm

/// Because doctors don't just let people die. ///

They do in Egypt apparently.

[anotheoldgit]

anthro-nerd

But all our 'tourists' don't have insurance, they don't even pay their bill.

It's over to the good old tolerant UK, have your baby, get rid of your baby etc, etc, all on the good old cash stricken NHS, then back from whence they came.

[Mamyalynne]

What a sad outcome, his poor family and friend of course who was there.