Japanese Health Care is Accessible at Least
I’ve had a bit more experience with the health care system in Japan than I would like, mainly due to my taking up jiu-jitsu at the unwise age of 40.
It’s not perfect. There seem to be a lot of doctors who aren’t quite as good as you might want them to be, and it can sometimes take time and effort to get the care you want or need.
But at least health care is accessible here. And you can more or less choose where you get it from. If you have a regular need it would probably make sense to shop around until you find a good clinic for your needs.
After trying a huge number, I now have a go-to dentist, orthopaedic clinic, ENT, and skin clinic. Anything else I will need to roll the dice with a bit.
My wife got a bad cold and cough in July, and it has been making her life miserable ever since. She saw a doctor in Japan before we went to Europe, a doctor in Spain, another doctor when we got back and none of them managed to do anything for her.
Last week she went to a big hospital and they diagnosed her with pneumonia and got her to check in immediately. She’ll be in for a few weeks it seems.
Scary stuff.
If you have a health issue and the first (or second) doctor you see doesn’t help, keep trying until you find a solution. In Japan, you really have to advocate for yourself when it comes to healthcare. Stay safe out there!
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This week’s books
Finished the Locke Lamora trilogy by Scott Lynch. Apparently I had blanked out how awful the third book is (it was actually supposed to be a seven book series, but the author stopped writing them in 2013). My advice would be to read the first two and pretend the third one doesn’t exist.
This week’s TV
I started watching Mr Inbetween when I was in the UK. Had seen some clips on YouTube and it looked interesting. It’s an Australian series (3 seasons, 30 minute episodes) about a hitman.
REALLY good. I was happy to find it on Disney+ but when I got back to Japan I couldn’t find it. Turns out it isn’t available here at all that I could find.
This week I got a VPN just so I could finish watching it. That’s how good it is. If you have Disney+ and a VPN, the UK version of the site has all three series.
This week’s links
- Not enough, and not quick enough, but nice to see some progress: Looking to Emerging Technologies to Power Japan’s Green Transition: METI Official on the Costs and Opportunities of Renewable Energy
- A promising approach, if governments are not going to do anything: ‘Typhoons have prevented me going to school’: The children behind South Korea’s landmark climate win
- Interesting analysis of potential UK tax rises (also very interesting to think about what might happen in Japan). Are you selling ahead of a capital gains tax rise?
- Might have to go and check it out: Japan’s Second City Can Finally Make Tokyo Jealous
- This was very interesting (there’s a transcript if you don’t like podcasts): Valuable Lessons from My Eighth Year of Freedom
What do you think? Anything interesting in there?
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Pneumonia is a serious problem, of course, but one of the problems to be aware of is that Japanese hospitals want you to be inpatients so they can make money on your board and lodgings. I had an op that is a day case in the States but the doc here wanted me to stay a week! I declined and he quickly changed it to the night before and after. So, yeah, money.
That is possible of course, but my wife is in pretty bad shape now so she needs oxygen from time to time.
The hospital did give her the choice of coming in twice a day for treatment instead, but it is easier to check in and have them look after her 24/7. Fortunately she was able to get a private room so is somewhat comfortable.
I hate hospitals, so I am very interested in home treatment (paying for a nurse or doctor to come to my home to administer treatment) should it become necessary in the future!
I’m a huge Ray fan. Mr Inbetween is one of their best shows I’ve seen. It’s criminal that more people don’t know about it. Glad you found it.
It’s amazing. Deserves to be at least as big as John Wick.
hope everyone recovers quickly and regains normal health. thanks for the tv show tip. I’ve heard it’s important for foreigners to go to a major hospital or clinic for minor maladies just to be registered with a card so that there is better chance of treatment in an emergency. Can you do a write up on how foreigners are treated by the Japanese healthcare system in emergency situations? Keep up the great work!
Thanks! I have personally never had a situation where I felt I was treated differently by a health professional because I am non-Japanese. I have heard stories where people had negative experiences though.
Having a patient record at a hospital and a card might make things slightly easier in terms of not needing to register again, but then again in an emergency are you going to have the card on you? Not sure it is worth being that pre-emptive.
It is worth keeping your health insurance card or My Number card handy, and of course being able to communicate in Japanese is probably going to make things smoother.
What a coincidence. I just got out of the hospital after a two month stay and 3 operations. I was diagnosed with rectal cancer in mid June. The doctor told me to go into the hospital immediately. I have been out almost a month but I still have a lot of pain and it hurts to sit which is problematic. It has pushed me into full retirement although my doctor has urged me to work a little part time when the next school year comes around next April. I’ll be 70 next year so I figure there is no sense in doing that and that I can spend more time going to baseball games in Japan and the states. I had been doing it in Japan for a while until this cancer popped up. Fortunately I kept the health part of my life insurance and also have cancer insurance. It will easily take care of my costs and then some. The care I got was excellent and they pushed me to exercise which I did not like but glad that they pushed me to do it. I have national health insurance as well so I completely covered all my expense.
Very sorry to hear. Hope you are able to recover fully soon. Staying fit after a hospital stay is really tough, as you lose so much muscle from the inactivity.
I probably wouldn’t go back to work in your situation either!
Sorry to hear that. Hope you’re comfortable. May I ask what were your symptoms?
Not really symptoms as the operation is over. My symptoms before the diagnosis was non-stop diarrhea which could not be controlled even with every known med. Doctor sent me to the hospital/ Since the surgeries (I had 3) I have serious pain in the rectum which makes it hard to sit for any length of time. Its getting better tho. I also have pain where my stomach was stitched up and I have a colostomy bag attached to my stomach which of course is not comfortable. I have learned how to change it which I need to do every few days. In the hospital I changed it every day with the help of a nurse so that I could learn how to do it.
It is now Oct 26 and I still have pain. Apparently this recovery will take a long time. There is a group in America that has a Facebook page for people like me. It is interesting to see their stories but I am discouraged by some who say I may be in pain for quite a while longer. So I have decided that my working life is over and will just hang around till the end which frankly I hope comes sooner rather than later.
Oh I’m so so sorry to hear about the pain. It must be real painful if you’re hoping for the end.
Is there no pain med that can at least ease it a bit? Are you seeing another doctor who can prescribe? I have a high pain tolerance but a root canal toothache almost mad me considered the end.
Please take care Dan.
I pretty much have all the meds they can give me. I had joined a group online of people with similar problems and they tell me to hang in there and that it just takes time to heal. One person told me I should expect to get better in another six months which was very disheartening but still gave me a timeline to shoot for. So I will persevere a little longer. Today it is rather painful but I have done my food shopping and can relax at home. So here I be.
Where are you watching Disney+ with the vpn? On your tv? I want to see so many shows but I’m just paying for nothing. If I know how to add vpn to my Toshiba tv I’d be a happy lad.
Hope the wife gets well soon. As much as the health care system here is great, I hate being there.
I didn’t realize until yesterday, but it’s pretty easy to install the VPN app on the TV (I have an Android TV)
Sorry to hear about your wife’s condition, Ben.
You bring to mind a key point about the otherwise-excellent JP healthcare system: Patients are expected to know what is wrong with them before they go to the doctor (in many cases, in order to go and visit the correct type of doctor). If you get it wrong, then the doctor you visit will invariably to help as best they can according to their field of experience, which can lead to some unsatisfactory outcomes. This places a lot of the onus on the patient.
I think that adding the role of a General Practitioner (i.e. an expert to to tell the patient which specialist they should go and see) into the flow would make a huge difference in terms of effectiveness.
That’s a good point and something that really confused me for a while.
I still struggle sometimes to know which clinic to go to first for a given thing…
Having a first point of contact would be nice.
I am lucky on that we have a local general practice doctor in our neighbourhood. It’s where we have our health checks, but if I ever feel something is wrong, I pop up there and she will usually tell me which clinic to go to. Not sure if this is a common thing or if we are just lucky.
Ben, did you sign up for Disney+ on Japanese internet or when you were connected to the UK by VPN? I’m trying the latter and it won’t accept Paypal or my credit card details. If I sign up for the Japanese Disney+, will using the VPN automatically send me to the UK version?
I had a Japanese Disney+ account and when I was travelling overseas it just logged me into the local version.
Same thing happens through the VPN.
Mr Inbetween. It’s a great show.
There is an another Australian show from 2015 that was recommended called “No Activity” which is more of a comedy.
I`ll be checking that one out.
Have fun.
That looks good! Good enough that they made a US version and also a Japanese version of it…
Where is the original Aussie one available to watch?
If you require a specialist, or a pediatrician, it is advised to research carefully and to do your own research. There are online doctors you can pay for quick diagnosis and prognosis 24 hours a day for example educated at the best medical institutions. At least you have something to compare. Went to three doctors in Japan (international, local, and then large local hospital) for fever and what I though was urinary tract infection for my baby. We needed antibiotics plain and simple. The large hospital wanted to insert a tube into the baby’s penis to verify exactly what bacteria was present. Baby crying alone 30 minutes with three Japanese hospital workers without any parent to soothe him? Nope. Flew to South Korea the same evening, we knew that antibiotics would be needed irrespective of verifying the “right bacteria”. Ridiculous process, we knew something was off. South Korean hospital, same day entrance, incredibly efficient, they take urine samples and then grow the bacteria within 20 minutes in house. Done in less than an hour. 21st century process. Confident doctors with modern approaches. Check up in Japan is okay. If it is my treatment, I’m okay with 1980s, 1990s approaches to medicine. But something serious or more important like a baby? You are at your own risk…
Sorry to hear about your wife, Hope she makes a full a full recovery.
As regards good series to watch, I would highly recommend Better call Saul (The follow on series from breaking bad)