Medical Tourism vs Us Standard Care- RRP- wife relates experience

I write this as the wife of a recovering prostate cancer patient. Early this year, at the age of 50, my husband Robert’s annual check up showed that he was in great health, except for an elevated PSA of 4.95. Subsequent visits to the urologist, and 12 biopsies followed. The results of the biopsies were that 7 out of 12 samples showed sign of prostate cancer. We were stunned. However our doctor reassured us since they had caught it early, Robert’s chances were good. However our surprise turned to panic because Robert lost his job last year, and with it, went our health insurance. We could not imagine paying for something like this. Of course there was no choice, I wanted to Robert to get better. Our primary care doctor advised us that to go with robotic surgery. They recommended a surgeon in CT, but we knew he would be expensive. I had heard from friends who had gone overseas for plastic surgery and that other procedures were pretty cheap outside of the States. So I started researching this option.

Then I came across this article: www.marketwire.com/press-release/RoboticoncologyCom-1044300.html. It made a lot of sense to me. We could not gamble with my husband’s life, no matter the cost. I appreciated the viewpoint from the doctor in the article, Dr. David Samadi, from Mt. Sinai in NY. He even mentioned in the article that many hospitals work out financial details and payment options with you. I figured it this way. We financed our house, our cars and Robert’s life was much more valuable than any of that. In the end, we did go with the surgeon in CT, and was thankful we did. Had I read this article before our decision, we would have decided even sooner to get him treated in the States.
Robin Bertorelli
Middletown, CT

Robin, I added a Subject to your post, so people can know what it relates to.

Post Edited By Moderator (James C.) : 9/16/2009 9:36:06 AM (GMT-6)

Hi Robin,
Dr. Samadi makes some great points that I have been aware of in the discussion of taking risk by flying to foreign countries for medical care. It's just not great advice to do it. And you are correct, most hospitals and practices can work out a payment schedule for the uninsured. It is terrible to have to go through this disease without coverage. And for some in this recession, they don't have jobs to make payments anyway.

You did very well on your research. How is your husband doing?

Tony

Robin, welcome, and I am glad your husband is doing so very well, that is what we all want in that situation. Did the doctor really promise zeros? Just curious, that would be a risky promise to make to any patient considering the fickled nature of PCa.

David in SC

Best wishes to you and your husband and thanks for sharing that article.
Larry

COBRA rules only cover firms with x amount of employees, state regulations vary immensely, from no coverage to 18 months. Here in SC, Blue Cross was forced to carry me for 6 months after I was laid off, and my employer generously paid for the premium, so that I was covered through the time of my surgery.

Hi David

Yes we were told to expect zero to near zero levels of PSA post - surgery and so far so good. And just as stated above, we were not eligible for COBRA. But we made payment arrangements that were reasonable. To tell you the truth, I would paid any amount for this outcome so we are thrilled. Thanks all for the well wishes!