Managing within the health care system


Well Quebec is an interesting case study, what can I say? There is a lot of patient experiences now, you’ll find in Quebec where people have to pay out-of-pocket for some of their stuff because there are 250 doctors in Quebec that are outside of RAMQ (Régie de l'assurance maladie du Québec) and many of them are breast cancer surgeons or medical oncologists. My medical oncologist joined the private system midway through my treatment so when I began with him my RAMQ card worked and now when I go to him my VISA card works. 

You know and I’m not it’s not a political statement I’m making about it it’s just as a patient it’s really difficult to have these things change on you especially mid-treatment and when you get used to an oncologist, you don’t want to give up that expertise and so patients are quite vulnerable and these doctors are allowed to do this. I think they actually think that they can provide better service to a smaller patient group when they’re in the for-profit system so I understand it’s not a simple answer, it’s just that it was surprising to me that I had to pay for my care.

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