Sick of Waiting Times? Travel to Your Next Appointment

Let’s face it: more often than not, going to the doctor means sitting in a waiting room for an extended period of time. In countries like England and Canada, there is at least a four-week wait between the time you make your appointment and the time you get to see your physician. For patients who can’t afford to wait for healthcare in their home countries, medical tourism has introduced a way for patients to skip the waiting times by travelling abroad for healthcare. If you’ve been thinking of doing the same, MedHalt recently published an in-depth look at the impact of wait times on medical tourism and the countries with the lowest wait times in the world. Here are some of the highlights:

What are waiting times? 

MedHalt defines waiting times as, “the length of time between the date a patient agrees to a procedure and is placed on the waiting list, to the date of receiving the service s/he is waiting for.” They can occur for any of the following reasons:

1. Services that are poorly organized
2. Not enough healthcare workers
3. Lack of teamwork among physicians

Why are there variations in waiting times?

There are a number of factors that can cause variations in waiting times, but the most common reasons are:

1. Emergency cases: An increase in the number of emergency cases can increase the wait times for non-urgent cases because the sicker patients are cared for first.
2. Seasonal variations in capacity: The seasonal reduction in services during peak vacation periods may result in increased wait times.
3. Availability of health providers and resources: The availability of healthcare professionals in the operating room and nursing unit can influence how quickly people receive surgery. Additionally, the unavailability of inpatient hospital beds for surgical patients can be a limiting factor, resulting in postponement or cancellation of elective operations.

It is not uncommon in some countries to have waiting lists for a year or more in length for certain medical procedures. Patients thus rely on medical tourism and travel abroad to countries that offer quicker procedures to save time and avoid aggravation of their medical conditions.

Countries with long waiting times

Among the total number of patients looking for treatment from a specialist, 60% in England and 57% in Canada have to wait for at least four weeks before they can even consult with a medical specialist. These countries have the highest percentages of waiting patients in the world. 

1. Canada has the highest percentage of patients (36%) who have to wait six days or more for an appointment with a doctor.
2. Waiting lists for non-essential surgery such as knee reconstructions have been as long as 18 months in the UK, and over 2 years in Australia and Canada.
3. 57% of physicians in the U.K. and 51% of Canadian physicians reported that their patients experienced long waits for diagnostic tests.
4. The United States had a large percentage of people (61%) who said that getting care on nights, weekends, or holidays, without going to the emergency room, was somewhat difficult. In Canada, it was 54%, in the U.K., 38% and in Germany, 22%.

All these countries perform poorly, compared to most other industrialized countries, on how long patients have to wait to get a regular appointment with a primary care physician or after-hours care. However, the problem is most acute in the United States. 

There is emerging evidence that lengthy waits to get a doctor’s appointment have become the norm in many parts of American healthcare. This includes patients with private insurance as well as those with Medicaid or Medicare.

Waiting times for different medical services here vary greatly by market and specialty. For example, patients wait an average of 29 days nationally to see a dermatologist for a skin exam, 66 days to have a physical exam in Boston and 32 days for a heart evaluation by a cardiologist in Washington.

Americans are also more likely to wait for office-based medical appointments, since they are not good sources of revenue for hospitals and doctors, than any other form of treatment. In other countries, particularly not of the west, people tend to wait longer for expensive elective care.  

Countries with low waiting times 

1. Thailand and India are two South Asian countries that have almost instantaneous knee reconstruction surgeries.
2. France, Germany and Belgium have short waiting times for hip replacement and cataract surgeries.
3. The United Kingdom and Finland have experienced large reductions in waiting times from a relatively high level in the early 2000s.
4. Ireland has witnessed considerable reductions in waiting times of patients on the list for orthopedic treatment, prostatectomy and cholecystectomy.
5. In several Asian nations, patients are able to reduce the wait time of elective surgeries like nose jobs, and also hip and knee replacements, while also saving considerably on costs.

You can read the full report here.