State of the Canadian Health Care System

I'd love to rant and rave about the health care system, but I'm not up to it.

I'm sick.

I had to go to the emergency room here in town (where there is no doctor actually at the hospital). I didn't get to see a doctor, but the nurse talked to one on the phone.

I also found out that the clinic here in town has been treating me for a chronic problem with strong antibiotics after I have continually tested negative for the condition. Last count, it was four rounds of unnecessary antibiotics. You would think that a doctor would go, "hmm...something's not right...."

So tomorrow, I get to go back to the clinic and demand to see a doctor. The ER nurse was furious they wouldn't let me make an appointment earlier in the day. She told me that if I couldn't get in to call her and she'd raise hell.

Pretty pathetic, I think.

I didn't set out to go to the emergency room. I tried to make an appointment to see my doctor at the clinic. For an acute problem, I was offered an appointment two weeks from today. Wow. Now that's service.

I said I couldn't wait that long, I was uncomfortable and getting worse. Second option? Go in tomorrow and see the "on call" doctor, who handles walk-in cases. If he or she has the time.

Well, that's what I have had to do for the last year and a half. That's why no one has checked my test results, or forwarded the information on to me that something is wrong. Every time I go in, I see a different doctor. They send me home with the obvious treatment, and don't follow up on the tests they order. I had a four month wait TO MAKE AN APPOINTMENT for my yearly exam and tests, which they eventually cancelled on me anyway.

Seems I did have enough energy to rant, eh?

Where does that leave me? Worried, at home, in pain, and no closer to an answer. Worst of all, I have no idea when I'll have an answer.