| Carsten, I'm very sorry to hear about what happened to your wife's aunt. And I agree, those who can't pay is being denied of the chance to see a doctor. After some unpleasant experences visiting doctors in Shanghai, I wouldn't want to go anymore unless I had some acute illess that I couldn't wait to go back to the States. I've been to both the VIP ward where mostly foreigners go to as well as the regular one locals go to at Dongfang Hospital in Lujiazui, Pudong. I did both just to compare the difference. Basically, the differences were : 1)Registration fee: 100 Yuan for the VIP ward vs. 11Yuan(I believe) for the locals. 2) Not much a difference with the doctors you see you save time. A nurse at the VIP ward took me to the doctor, who's housed in the regular ward. I didn't need to wait in line, so time was saved. While with a local's registration, one has to wait outside the doctors' offices for a long time. 3) I was prescribed with 3-4 medicines beside the antibiotics given via an IV for three days. It appeared that some of the medicines were not necessary. I stopped taking them after one day. I had to pay another 100 Yuan each time to receive IV given in the VIP ward, which was quite clean and had only one other patient there. My total bill was something like 400 Yuan in total the first time and two hundred something the next two days. Some clinics seeing expats charge like the doctors would charge in the States. 4 years ago when I first moved to SH I heard about World Link. One day I went into one of its clinics by Hotel Portman Ritz Carlton. I wanted to pick up a brochure listing what services it provided and what doctors they had. Surprisingly, the receiptionist woudln't give out this informaiton. Meantime, I saw the fees posted in a billborad on the wall. I was shocked to see the consultation fee was something like 1,300 Yuan. Maybe they figure folks going there have overseas insurance coverages, so why not charging them an arm and leg. Although I had excellent medical insurance that pays 90%, I wouldn't want to go to World Link because I don't like to reward those who rip people off. Luckly, I was very healthy and rarely needed to see doctors in Shanghai. A friend of mine had gull bladder stones and was in great pain when she visited Beijing. She went to a hospital . To enroll in the hospital, they took her credit card as a guarantee. She was kept there 3 days without the necessary surgery. They kept giving her injections of pain killer. She spoke with a Beijing friend who told her to change a hospital. But it would not release her inspite of her persistence. Her friend was an influential businessman who had to come and fight with this hospital and finally they released her. The bill came to over 7,000 USD for her stay. She was rushed to the second hospital and had a surgery that night. She had to give "red packet" money(10,000 Yuan for 4 of them) to all doctors who operated on her there. The story afterwards is long, but I won't get into it. Bottom line, have a good check up before leaving your country. Bring some medicines for common sickness(sore throat, cold etc) or discomfort to minimize having to go to the doctors. |
Living Cost in Shanghai - Medicine