Medical Care in China is So Inexpensive

[David_PA]

This afternoon we went to the Chengdu Women’s and Children’s hospital for a prenatal checkup for my wife. First, she had to get a medical records card for 5 RMB, then she had to pay 16 RMB to see the doctor. That was it… the total cost was less than $4 dollars. I was shocked – I can’t believe it’s so inexpensive.

Every news article I read about healthcare in China up to this point mislead me. The articles said because there are no appointments, people have to wait hours or days, but we walked right in without a wait. The hospital system seemed computerized, although they didn’t take a history and physical like an American doctor’s office would and I didn’t see them document anything about the visit. No weight, height, blood pressure readings were taken, they just went right to the chief complaint. We were in and out in less than 10 minutes.

Is this normal or did we get lucky and visit on a slow day?

[Charlie]

Hard to say for sure, but I was wondering the same thing the last time I went Huaxi hospital in Chengdu. I was in an out in about 20 minutes and paid less than 40 rmb for a visit to the doctor and medicine. The cost is about 20x less than in the US and far faster and with less hassle.

My employer recently begun offering health insurance but I barely see the point when it’s so cheap!

[Rick in China]

@David
It’s cheap, yes. However, you often get what you pay for – giving birth here should run you like ~20-60k all in (Chengdu) and even at that, there is little in the way of ‘service’, expect to sleep on, if you’re lucky, a cot..and have to spend 24/7 with your wife while she’s there since you’ve got to do a lot of ‘nurse work’ yourself, like changing IV drips in some cases or handling bed pans or changing bed sheets or whatever. It varies with whatever you pay for, but even if you get “VIP treatment” it’s hardly what you’d expect as standard hospital care. Are you planning on giving birth here, or just doing prenatal check-ups?

[Paul]

I broke my arm a few months ago. In the end, the initial x-ray, CAT scan, and cast ended up costing just under 1,000 rmb. One thing I noticed when I started telling people the price is that all Americans (including me) thought that it was ridiculously cheap, while people from everywhere else in the world thought it was really expensive, especially Europeans and Canadians.

[Paul]

Oh yeah. The cast was sketchy as hell since after a week, it started to fall apart due to absorbing too much sweat. I was only told to wear the cast for 3 to 4 weeks, with no appointment to get a new one if the one I had gets dirty and disgusting, and it did after 3 weeks.

And physical therapy was cheap too. For only 4 sessions of an hour each I just had to pay 200 rmb. Granted if I didn’t speak Chinese and I didn’t have a Chinese friend who is a physical therapist, I wouldn’t have ever found out about it.

[David_PA]

@Rick, we are just doing the prenatal visits here and then giving birth in the US. Thanks for the info, it’s good to know for the future.

@Paul, thanks for sharing your story. I’ve never bought travel health insurance when coming to China because I always assumed that I could get patched up cheaply and 1200 RMB is much less than travel insurance for a few weeks.

[Rick in China]

@David
For the prenatal visits that’s great then – it’s very cheap, and until you get later in pregnancy we never experienced much in terms of waiting in lines or anything either. Later on, some of the visits have *ENORMOUS* waits, like, I remember one time we had to wait 3 hours which ultimately ended in checking, with a seamstress girth thing, her weight and width, we didn’t know that’s all it was for until we had waited for ages. Since you’re a foreigner, if you do end up with ultrasounds etc they have no problem with you sitting in while the ultrasounds are going on – and seems they have no problem telling you the baby’s sex if you choose to, and even offered it like “we don’t tell Chinese people but since the father’s foreigner do you want to know the sex?” casually while doing the checkups. Seems we’re treated well enough in that sense 🙂 but for giving birth, going back to US is a GOOD PLAN. I will not have another baby in China.

[annie.leblanc]

@ Rick in China,

Could I be so bold as to press you for more details as to why you wouldn’t (or your wife, rather) have another child in China?  I would have to weigh the pros and cons, but I would have to know what they are.  If it’s just you and your spouse flying back to the US, that’s not such a big deal.  If it’s you and your spouse and other children, it automatically becomes more complicated.

[Author]

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