On Health Care in Panama

10/9/09

Here's my latest idea for a Fulbright fellowship! Travel around to different countries and get sick. Seek health care. Wait in a variety of settings for a variety of services. Get your vital signs taken by an attendant with gizmos you've never seen before. Wait some more. See the kind doctor and mime your symptoms since you can't remember the vocabulary you looked up 10 minutes ago. Listen to his/her carefully enunciated instructions, which seem clear at the time. Leave the clinic and sit outside, searching in your dictionary for something that sounds like what the doctor said to you. Take his/her scrawled prescriptions to the nearest pharmacy and search in your dictionary for something that sounds like what the pharmacist is saying to you. Go home and try to remember the dosage and schedule for the at-least-three medications-per-illness. Begin taking the medicines as you are supposing they were prescribed even if you can't find out anything about them on-line. See if you get better. Record your experiences....

We've been living in Panama for 14 months and so far the health care here has been wonderful. I wish I hadn't needed quite so much of it, but that's not their fault. So far I have had acute heat exhaustion, annoying peri-menopausal symptoms, two bouts of shingles (or something like it), and now, a persistent cough. For all but the menopausal symptoms I went to the little 24-hour clinic located in our neighborhood shopping center. As far as I can tell, they don't take appointments, but I have always been seen, in my turn, in a very reasonable amount of time. The clinic is absolutely bare bones - a simple waiting room with about 12 chairs, an alcove where vital signs are taken, a restroom, and several small exam rooms. The only art in the waiting room is a painting of Jesus on the cross, although the clinic has no explicit religious affiliation. The same efficient, cheerful receptionist has always been there when I arrived, no matter what time of day or evening. (I asked her once if she lives there. She smiled and said sort of.) All but once I have seen the same doctor, a large, handsome Panamanian man who is unfailingly polite and attentive. I don't know for SURE that he is a good doctor, but every time he has treated me I have gotten better, and he makes me feel welcome and cared about (complementing my Spanish as it improves, remembering my last visit, etc.) The clinic probably has a special place in my heart because the first time I went there I was so sick that it felt like they literally saved my life, but even when I am not feeling so awful, I have always felt better mentally when I walk out than I did walking in. I can definitely NOT say that for American health care! Most doctor visits at home leave me feeling foolish, rushed, dissed, or unaddressed. To the extent that mental well-being is an important component of physical health, I would take Panamanian health care any day.