Question for those who have national health care

[rolanni]

I have been told that in nations with socialized medicine (my correspondent uses the UK as their example) a person who has broken their hip will wait an average of three months for treatment.

Can anyone tell me if this is so?

Thanks.

Comments

[autopope.livejournal.com]

You failed to distinguish between chronic and acute admissions.

My dad went into a (UK, NHS) hospital with a suspected stroke. Time to MRI scan: 48 hours (they needed to stabilize him first).

My wife went into a (UK, NHS) hospital with a persistent migraine. Time to MRI scan: 3 months (after the neurologist ruled out a brain tumor or other emergency requiring instant diagnosis).

From these two data, you could conclude that the NHS takes an average of 6 weeks to carry out needed MRIs ... but the conclusion would be junk because the conflation of an acute/emergency case and a chronic/non-emergency makes for a junk data set.