Global Healthcare 101

Hello there!

Today we had such a fantastic experience learning from students from all over the world and were able to embrace our roles as global citizens! We were given the opportunity to interact with Thai, Chinese, and Indonesian students and learn more about their healthcare systems.

Going into this discussion, I felt knowledgable about some of the basic information about the Thai healthcare system. The Chinese healthcare system did seem a lot more complicated than I expected. They don't really have universal coverage, as I had once assumed, and a lot of their insurance companies are funded by employers. They also have a tertiary system for hospitals with tier one being the nicest and most expensive and tier 3 was the cheapest. More similar to the US, they have  prescription medications and non prescription medications, which are more common. Some more common medications, such as amoxicillin, are available over the counter without a prescription, which is more similar to the Thai system. It was a bit more challenging to learn about the Chinese healthcare system because the students were majoring in Thai and not well versed in medicine.

In Indonesia, their healthcare spending is a lot less than the US, and depending on the level of care they receive it can range from $1 to $50 per visit. They have four levels of care, which includes a basic clinic in the community with a doctor, a pharmacy, a clinic, and a hospital. Patients are only allowed to go to the hospital if they have been referred by the clinic or if it is considered a medical emergency.

It was such a fascinating learning experience to hear from students from other countries about their healthcare systems and compare and contrast to the US. As a part of our bonding experience, we also designed antimicrobial stewardship campaigns. This group project really fostered productive conversations and allowed us to educate the Chinese students about antimicrobial resistance. Although every group had a few bumps in the road in terms of communicating across 3 or 4 languages, we truly bonded with these students and learned a lot. This has been one of my favorite experiences thus far in Thailand and has taught me a lot about how people with very different backgrounds aren't so different after all.

Thanks for reading!
Maddie Pryor