My first medical care in the UK

Something might seem perfectly normal to most people in the UK, but as my first experience, it’s still worth writing it down. Believe or not, after living in this country for more than 6 years, I’ve only been to the hospital once – and that was for required medical check before I left for Japan. I suppose that’s something to be grateful about. I had a very healthy life.

With the effort to keep up with healthy lifestyle, I go swimming regularly. But last weekend when I was enjoying myself with the clean water in my gym’s pool, some water went into my ear. I tried my best to get them out with all the tools and method I could think of, but they just didn’t want to come out. After a few days, I found myself lost some level of hearing and realized it’s time to seek proper medical help.

I searched the net to find my yet to register local GP’s number. I was told that I need to register first before I can book an appointment with the nurse (not a doctor yet), and the next available appointment is about three weeks later. Three weeks later? Suddenly I understood why people complained about HNS so much at that point. However the lady advised me to visit a walk-in-clinic if I need urgent assistance.

Surprisingly I wasn’t asked for any ID or National Insurance number when I visited the one near Liverpool Street Station. Just filled in a form and waited for 40 minutes and a doctor called my name. He doubled checked my ear and found there were something there, but he didn’t have the equipment to remove it at the clinic so advised me to visit a hospital as soon as possible. When I left he provided me a map to the hospital, and also a statement for me to prove to my company that I need to do that ASAP. The next morning I woke up early in the morning and be the first patient in St Bartholomew’s Hospital’s minor injury room. The doctor checked my ear again and finally helped me to remove the foreign object out of my ear. Thankfully, it didn’t get infected.

So this is my first experience of medical care as a tax payer of this country. Throughout the walk-in-clinic and hospital visit, what surprised me was that I didn’t need to provide any ID or pay any money. Compare to my experience of seeing a medical care in China, regardless what the problems are, first thing when I walked into a hospital was to pay a registration fee before a doctor can see you. After that normally the doctors will advise you to take some prescription which will cost you more (sometimes they are not even necessary but they will still prescribe you some). I called my parents in China about my experiences and they were surprised by the fact that I didn’t need to pay anything for medical care. Free medical care in China is still something that everyone dream of. To most low income families in China, any unexpected accident can become a huge burden to a family’s budget – worse it might even make them go into huge debt. No wonder a popular saying goes – being healthy is best investment. At least that’s what I know in China.