Healthcare Adventures (1)

It happened again. I started writing today's blog entry on my iPad while driving home. It was about driving habits in Melbourne (I know, again!... but I can write a lot about this fascinating subject)and how I believe such habits are related to the culture of a place. But my blog theme changed after I got home and took Tiziano to the doctor. He injured his foot playing tennis three days ago. We went to the Emergency Room the following morning at a major medical center in Melbourne. Two hours later, Tiziano walked out with half a cast on his foot and a preliminary result of the X-ray. Nothing conclusive emerged, but because Tiziano felt something breaking/snapping in his foot, the cast was supposed to immobilize it until he had an MRI done and thus, doctors could figure out what was the injury. As you see, I didn't speak about treating the injury. So the following day we went to the General Practitioner, who read the final X-ray report and concluded what we knew, that an MRI was needed to tell us what happened with his foot. A $63 later she gave Tiziano the referral for MRI (Medicare will reimburse us about $40 of this fee). In a private imaging center, where neither universal (Medicare) nor private insurance are taken, he had the MRI of the foot done for a $295 out of pocket, non-reimbursable fee. Today, we went back to the GP to figure out how to care for this foot. Tiziano cannot use his right foot, so he has to be driven, needs help getting in and out of the shower, and clearly cannot do a lot of other chores. The GP read the MRI report to Tiziano, which said that he had a tear, some edema and scar formation in the fascia. She told him that she has never heard of such a thing and cannot recommend anything but a visit to a podiatrist, for whom there is no need of a referral. She didn't know any orthopedist either and she could not articulate any advice as to wether he should continue wearing the cast or not. Although he had no benefit from seeing the doctor, other than having a doctor read a few lines of text to him, he had to pay the Medicare fee of $63, from which you already know, Medicare will send us back about $40. Can a doctor claim she has never heard of a medical issue and still get paid? The Internet is full of references to fascia and torn plantar fascia stories, including scholarly articles on this subject. So this is not an issue a doctor can claim is rare. Why does a doctor not try harder to help someone injured (clearly unable to walk!) and instead sends them home without any advice? Does this sound scary just to me? What I do think is that healthcare is poor in this most livable place on Earth, but I may need a few more examples until I can draw the final conclusion... This picture is the print left by Tiziano, who walks now in one foot (left) due to a not so rare injury his doctor still has to learn about. I'm scared now.