Hospital

[GeezerCouple]

I'll answer the original question, not comment on insurance. One of our cruise friends had a heart attack just before we got to Grand Cayman. He was taken to the hospital in Georgetown. He got excellent care, was treated by English-trained physicians and got appropriate cardiac support. The hospital is not the same as a large teaching hospital with cardiac specialists and cardiac transplant experience, but my hometown hospital doesn't either.

 

Margee

 

 

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[emphasis added]

 

This situation is *exactly* one of the reasons why we have MedJetAssist.

 

The insurance beancounters - and the Grand Cayman Hospital - may "think" that this "cardiac care without cardiac specialists" is "appropriate" (or "satisfactory" or "adequate"), but we absolutely would not.

 

We happen to use a major teaching hospital as our "regular" hospital/health care, but even if we did not, for anything major/traumatic/serious, we'd want the "best available" care.

 

Assuming the patient was stable enough to travel in a fully equipped/staffed medevac plane, we absolutely would want to be moved.

 

(And with MedJetAssist, if there was some reason why some other major hospital would be "better" for <whatever> emergency, then we could be taken there instead, if in home country.)

 

The first "trick" in a medical emergency is surviving long enough to reach medical care.

And then, for serious medical events, the availability of advanced medical equipment and knowledgeable staffing... those could make the difference... and it doesn't always happen right away.

(That is, complications could set in later, when one *could* already be at a more advanced facility.)

 

We don't mind "compromising" on the quality of hotel rooms/locations (within reason/safety/etc.), but with medical care? No so much...

 

We hope we never need to use MedJetAssist, but we came much too close a year ago, when I landed in a hospital overseas, and we were increasingly worried that the care wasn't up to the needs.

Just as we were starting to discuss whether we might want to contact MedJetAssist, I finally started getting better.

Fortunately, we were able to resume our travels about a week later.

[soozles]

My dad had a heart attack on the ship, and then was airlifted to a Canadian hospital in Turks and Caicos, before being medivac to Florida. They were in the ER for a few hours, had to pay upfront though, always travel with a high limit credit card.

[CruiserGuyWPB]

Im curious, I might have missed it. I read the whole thread. But what was the diagnosis once they arrived home? Was the ship right to send them off? Was the island hospital right? I am just curious.:confused:

[klfrodo]

[emphasis added]

 

This situation is *exactly* one of the reasons why we have MedJetAssist.

 

The insurance beancounters - and the Grand Cayman Hospital - may "think" that this "cardiac care without cardiac specialists" is "appropriate" (or "satisfactory" or "adequate"), but we absolutely would not.

 

We happen to use a major teaching hospital as our "regular" hospital/health care, but even if we did not, for anything major/traumatic/serious, we'd want the "best available" care.

 

Assuming the patient was stable enough to travel in a fully equipped/staffed medevac plane, we absolutely would want to be moved.

 

(And with MedJetAssist, if there was some reason why some other major hospital would be "better" for <whatever> emergency, then we could be taken there instead, if in home country.)

 

The first "trick" in a medical emergency is surviving long enough to reach medical care.

And then, for serious medical events, the availability of advanced medical equipment and knowledgeable staffing... those could make the difference... and it doesn't always happen right away.

(That is, complications could set in later, when one *could* already be at a more advanced facility.)

 

We don't mind "compromising" on the quality of hotel rooms/locations (within reason/safety/etc.), but with medical care? No so much...

 

We hope we never need to use MedJetAssist, but we came much too close a year ago, when I landed in a hospital overseas, and we were increasingly worried that the care wasn't up to the needs.

Just as we were starting to discuss whether we might want to contact MedJetAssist, I finally started getting better.

Fortunately, we were able to resume our travels about a week later.

 

Hate to break it to you. I work in a teaching/university hospital.

 

Those "specialists" are not the ones working on you. Their interns or residents are doing all the work. Those "specialists" are teaching, doing research, and publishing papers in Medical Journals.

[margeecruiser]

A little more information regarding my friend who had the heart attack. The ship was almost to Grand Cayman when the event happened. He was taken to the ship's infirmary for a time, then off loaded to shore. This is a tender port. His wife was in a full leg brace from a badly sprained knee. We decided to disembark with them to help with luggage and logistics. The time spent in the Grand Cayman hospital was for evaluation by emergency staff, the cardiologist on staff and other specialists there. They stabilized him and they made the decision to send him home via regular air instead of a medical evacuation since he had a mild heart episode not a major heart attack. That was their decision, not ours.

 

We traveled home with them, again, to help with luggage and logistics. We were required to book our flights ourselves, which included flying to Miami, on to Houston, and on to Los Angeles for them. All with him in a wheelchair and his wife in full leg brace.

 

He came out of it fine although he had cardiac problems that caused his death 5 years later.

 

By the way, they had insurance, which reimbursed their costs. We were not covered because the emergency was not with us personally, but our friend. Remember, that is reimbursement. Everything had to be paid for at the time. Hospital, last minute airfare, hotels, food. Our friends maxed out 4 credit cards. Lesson form used: always travel with credit cards with high credit limits.

 

Margee

 

 

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Edited July 10, 2016 by margeecruiser

[sparks1093]

Many years ago an old school friend told me that while they were on vacation in St Lucia her dh had a heart attack. She said it was awful being in a hospital in a 3rd world country. I don't know the hospital nor what specifically was horrible but I thought I would share that as that seems to be the kind of info you were looking for.

 

"The term Third World arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO, or the Communist Bloc. The United States, Western European nations and their allies represented the First World, while the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, and their allies represented the Second World. This terminology provided a way of broadly categorizing the nations of the Earth into three groups based on social, political, cultural and economic divisions." from Wikipedia.

 

It might be better to use the term "underdeveloped country", but even then I am not sure that St Lucia would qualify.

[dickinson]

"The term Third World arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO, or the Communist Bloc. The United States, Western European nations and their allies represented the First World, while the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, and their allies represented the Second World. This terminology provided a way of broadly categorizing the nations of the Earth into three groups based on social, political, cultural and economic divisions." from Wikipedia.

 

It might be better to use the term "underdeveloped country", but even then I am not sure that St Lucia would qualify.

 

Sorry if I offended anyone. I used the term that person told me.

[sparks1093]

Sorry if I offended anyone. I used the term that person told me.

 

I certainly didn't take any offense, I happened to look up the term the other day in response to a different thread and was surprised to find out that many of us have been using it incorrectly (including myself;)).

[S&S Cruisers 1983]

Hate to break it to you. I work in a teaching/university hospital.

 

Those "specialists" are not the ones working on you. Their interns or residents are doing all the work. Those "specialists" are teaching, doing research, and publishing papers in Medical Journals.

 

Totally agree. I used to work at one as well. The interns and residents ask the nurses a lot of questions that I would think they should know the answers. ;)

[donaldsc]

Very difficult to read your large print and especially the bolding.

 

Look at the positive. It could be large type and pale yellow.

 

DON

[Hlitner]

Travel insurance with Emergency Evacuation coverage.

 

Just to clarify, just about all med evac policies require that you first be admitted to a local hospital. Most policies then say that any evacuation must have the clearance of the local attending physician and the insurance company. So if you need to be hospitalized in the Caribbean, you would almost always get , at least, your initial treatment at a Caribbean island hospital. Some of the islands, such as St Maarten and St Thomas have pretty decent hospitals. Some other islands do not have very good hospitals (or physicians) :(. We recall being on a RCI cruise when a crewman was seriously injured and needed to be quickly moved to a decent hospital. The Captain headed for the nearest port, which happened to be in the Dominican Republic. Because it was night, and the local navigation system was not approved for a night docking....the Captain had the crewman evacuated off the ship in an open lifeboat.

 

The following day, at a lecture by the Captain, a lady asked about evacuating a crew member to such a horrible place. The Captain quickly explained that no crew member of his was going to be treated in the DR...and that the company had sent a jet from Miami to immediately take the crew member to Miami. So this crew member went directly from the ship to an airport and off to Miami. But passengers do not normally get this kind of service (it is not permitted by most insurance). Bummer.

 

Hank

[bean24]

I've had to visit two ER's while on a cruise. I fell down a flight of stairs on a cruise sponsored excursion in Roaton Hounduras. The hospital I was taken to had no wheelchair, a very old X-ray machine and a huge hyperbaric chamber since many emergencies there are diving accidents. Thankfully I was cleared to return to the ship, where I received great care.

My son was 10 months old and got bronchiolitis in Bermuda. We were sent to the hospital there. The care was amazing, better than we've gotten at home. So I think it depends where you are when trouble starts.

 

 

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