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This doesn't make sense given statistics on five year survival rates. If a good chunk of the population couldn't get this good care it would be reflected, instead what we have is an actual representation of survival rates across USA which would include these people you are saying can't get the better care.
This is what you said: "Yes but it’s not wealthy retirees moving there. It’s couples who have savings and income but not enough to afford $800 a month for their supplemental policies."
To me that is a statement implying people who retire to Thailand are not wealthy, but rather cannot afford $800/month for insurance in USA and are thus forced to retire there. I must be interpreting it incorrectly.
I meant in general that’s who does this...am I on trial here?
About the health. Are I’m not going by stats alone I’m going by 35 years or so if being a health care consumer, and 20 years of working in health care.
I never said it was as good, I said it doesn’t matter how good it is if you don’t have access to the best care, which is the case for a good chunk of the population, and many may be able to afford better care there than they can here. I said a top cancer doc there is probably better than a mediocre one here that you’re seeing only because he’s the only one in your plan accepting new patients.
I also never said only people trying to find a lower COL retire to Thailand and other lower. COL countries, I said primarily those are the folks that do because they can live a better retirement on their income there. Supplemental insurance was used as an example of the expense of retirement here.
Around here, retirees with Medicare go to places like Mass General and Dana Farber for cancer specialists. The majority of cancer patients are on Medicare. It’s not like the top Boston oncologists refuse Medicare patients. Medicaid is a different story. The reimbursement rates are so lousy that everyone loses money. It’s tough to get treatment.
I meant in general that’s who does this...am I on trial here?
Well when you state as an absolute that these people are who retire there and these people don't, apparently without having anything to back up your assertions, it's fair enough to question what you stated as fact. If you were just making assumptions that's fine, but why suddenly playing victim about being on trial when you're the one who was making things up?
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Originally Posted by ocnjgirl
About the health. Are I’m not going by stats alone I’m going by 35 years or so if being a health care consumer, and 20 years of working in health care.
So to be clear,we are to disregard studies that attempt to rank healthcare systems and instead go on the anecdotal viewpoint of one person? I don't think so. What you're spinning doesn't make sense. If you say most people can't afford the good treatment that repesents the survival rate for breast cancer in USA, but the overall survival rate is #1 in the world, it doesn't follow that the people who can't afford the best have worse care since they make up most of the average. They would pull it down, but the numbers we see are what they pull down. You get it?
Around here, retirees with Medicare go to places like Mass General and Dana Farber for cancer specialists. The majority of cancer patients are on Medicare. It’s not like the top Boston oncologists refuse Medicare patients. Medicaid is a different story. The reimbursement rates are so lousy that everyone loses money. It’s tough to get treatment.
Now we are back to affording supplementals. Many who can’t have to have managed Medicare Advantage plans with gatekeepers. At the rehab I work in, we get a lot of people who cannot afford supplementals (lower income rural area) and so even after massive strokes, the family tells us first day he can only stay for the 20 days Medicare covers fully, because they can’t afford the 20% copay. It might take 12 days for him to even be able to stand with one person. So they go home before they can walk, and end up bedbound at home. When if that person could stay 60 days, 85 days, they might have walked out with a cane.
I’ve seen this, for 20 years. I’ve seen the difference in outcomes when an Advantage plan resident gets cut 2 weeks into therapy vs the person who can afford to stay until they reach full recovery. So I don’t care where others’ opinion comes from, I speak only for myself and my posts are based on the life I’ve lived and no statistic is going to make that less real.
After spending all her savings on several years of assisted living, (hers now costs $9,000 a month), my mom is now on Medicaid which dictates (in NJ) a managed plan. She loved her dentist, but she can no longer go to him because he’s not in her plan. The hospital she goes to is dictated by the plan.
Had she been in a lower COL country, her SS and pension would have been enough to pay for an ALF and she would still have her savings.
That’s why I said these countries are very attractive to those who can’t afford a good retirement here. It’s not an insult that lower income people come there, and it doesn’t mean that some high income aren’t there too, but it seems some felt insulted by the concept that their low COL country is in fact attracting people looking for a low COL retirement.
On medical care in Thailand... My wife went in to her get annual lady parts dealie. They did everything including mammogram and she went with the optional ultrasound, cost $70 with very little time waiting. She got all results same day except for pap smear which they emailed to us later. This was actually slightly more than what it cost when we were living in Mexico but I don't think they did ultrasound there since it's more like US where they only do that if there was something suspicious with mammogram. Hospital was fine, wife said they basically had all the same equipment for her treatment that they have in USA.
I did a full physical, they had a package where it was about $100. They did blood work, chest x-ray, EKG, etc. all kinds of stuff I spend several hours being shuffled from office to office. They best part is they had the results from everything by the time you have you doctor consultation at the end, so he's got all the lab results and charts to go over and talk with you. He spoke English just fine, he said I'm fine but lay off the sodium and we were done. Again this is with little waiting, just walked in first thing in the morning with no appointment and they had the ball rolling within 20 minutes. They give you a folder with copies of everything in it, not that I know how to interpret it but I guess useful if some comparison needs to be made in the future with this baseline.
We've been to the dentist. Checkup and cleaning is $18, had two cavities and each cost about $17 for a resin filling. I've not checked but I'm assuming all the vanity type stuff is significantly cheaper than USA too.
Neither of us has had an emergency experience here (knock on bamboo) but from the perspective of an amateur observer their emergency medical transportation isn't like in USA. Their ambulances appear to be simple vans with just the basics to transport someone who is sick, I saw one arrive once where it had a driver and a nurse. We're talking a nurse like in a white skirt with the white cap, shoes, and stockings. It's nothing like the big rescue units in USA that are almost mobile mini-hospitals, and you also won't get are response by the nearest fire truck that has paramedics either it's going to be an ambulance sent from the hospital that's driving through traffic where people are far less likely to pull over to let it pass.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ocnjgirl
but it seems some felt insulted by the concept that their low COL country is in fact attracting people looking for a low COL retirement.
Some confuse others not accepting them making false claims with being insulted.
Lacking the discipline to do what one NEEDS to do versus what one WANTS to do, in retirement and pretty much everything else in life, is not something I'm willing to supply tax dollars to remedy. I think most everyone can sympathize with peoples' plights, but people also have to be accountable for their choices. And by people I mean everyone, not just select groups.
Well put. There is way too much of that, at almost any level of society. People who live extravagant lifestyles but barely put anything into savings, or people who make very little but decide they "deserve" the newest smart phone every year when many wealthy people I know don't upgrade their phone for 3-4 years even at a time because it's a wasteful idea to them. If you shouldn't suffer the consequences of your own stupidity, who should?! Society at large? Other tax payers? I don't think so. You reap what you sow.
There is a difference between someone who is down on their luck, got fired, but badly wants to work and just needs a helping hand back up, and someone who wastes and squanders every dime they get, and then continues to expect bailouts from everyone else.
Do realize that there are far MORE medical tourists in the United States than there are in Thailand. I have worked in several hospitals where at least 20% of the admissions were from Canada, the United Kingdom and the Middle East to name a few.
Do realize that there are far MORE medical tourists in the United States than there are in Thailand. I have worked in several hospitals where at least 20% of the admissions were from Canada, the United Kingdom and the Middle East to name a few.
Are they wealthy given the extremely high cost of medical care and medicine in this country? Money solves everything doesn't it?
Are they wealthy given the extremely high cost of medical care and medicine in this country? Money solves everything doesn't it?
Money indeed solves a vast passel of things. But no amount of money will make a Midwestern summer less humid or oppressive, or a Midwestern winter less blustery or bone-chilling. No amount of money will turn endless fields of corn and soybean into mountains, rivers, forests or beaches. No amount of money will alter the cultural ethos. Money famously influences elections, but no amount of money will really change our convictions on what we believe to be decent and proper, reasonable and wise - or their opposites. Money assuredly drives our decisions and actions, but can it sway hearts?
The question then obtrudes: suppose that we already have a modicum of money. Not a vast fortune, but something. Beyond what point, ought we to declare "enough to be enough", and thenceforth pursue quality of life? This is a question that often we can't much answer while still working full-time. But it's more accessible once in retirement, or at least semi-retirement.
Money indeed solves a vast passel of things. But no amount of money will make a Midwestern summer less humid or oppressive, or a Midwestern winter less blustery or bone-chilling. No amount of money will turn endless fields of corn and soybean into mountains, rivers, forests or beaches. No amount of money will alter the cultural ethos. Money famously influences elections, but no amount of money will really change our convictions on what we believe to be decent and proper, reasonable and wise - or their opposites. Money assuredly drives our decisions and actions, but can it sway hearts?
The question then obtrudes: suppose that we already have a modicum of money. Not a vast fortune, but something. Beyond what point, ought we to declare "enough to be enough", and thenceforth pursue quality of life? This is a question that often we can't much answer while still working full-time. But it's more accessible once in retirement, or at least semi-retirement.
Agreed. My reference to money solving everything was regarding healthcare and people coming to the U.S. for medical treatment from other countries, nothing else.
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