Sicko!

I had an unplanned encounter with the French medical system today. I am very impressed.

I went to the emergency room for something that I thought I had had before and knew what it was. A CT scan ruled that out pretty quickly so they ordered more tests, including a sonogram. The sonogram was to look for another specific thing, which they couldn't find, but the sonogram doctor kept trying until she came up with something no one else had thought of, which after the fact seemed obvious as a diagnosis.

It's less serious than either of the first two things they were testing for, and assuming the diagnosis is correct I should be fine in a couple of days.

So what, exactly, is impressive about it? Mainly that the doctors didn't seem as rushed as American doctors, and took a lot more time to thoroughly figure out what the problem was. Here they're on salary, not paid by the patient or the procedure, so they probably feel pressure to see fewer patients.

But that doesn't mean longer waiting times. In fact, I was in and out in seven hours including two major tests and two minor ones. And I was pretty busy during that time -- except for two hours waiting for the CT scan, I was either having a test or talking to a doctor at least once every half-hour. At a New York City emergency room, I could easily have spent seven hours without having those tests, which they would send me away to have scheduled elsewhere, later -- that's what they did when I had the similar problem a few years ago -- since my condition was not life-threatening.

I should add that it's not entirely fair to compare the hospital I went to in France, in an upscale suburb of Paris near where I work, with the hospital I went to previously in the heart of Manhattan. This place is probably more like the hospital in Greenwich, Connecticut. But still.

And there was one final delightful surprise in store at the pharmacy: They don't make you wait half an hour while they count the pills out from the big bottles into the little ones. Here, all the medicines (or at least the ones I needed: an antibiotic, an anti-inflammatory and a painkiller) come prepackaged in little boxes containing standard-size doses. One box of this, one box of that and you're out 2 minutes after you walked in.