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I recently went to the local hospital to pick up my prescription of tamoxifen prior to going to ID for a month and since I have severe osteoporosis I figured I should get an x-ray of my left wrist to ensure I had not broken it since I knew I would not be able to afford the cost of the x-rays in ID. I sat and waited at the ER for over 4 hours and there were only 2 other patients in the time I was there. When I was finally called in I was given a lecture of how I should go to my family doctor and not waste the time of the ER staff since the family doctor is paid $22.50 per visit while the ER doctor is paid $350 per hour. They grilled me for over an hour and I was shocked thinking I had awoken in a communist country and was public enemy number one. I’m not too popular at that hospital to begin with because I launched an investigation into over $2208 U.S. worth of insulin which they never returned to me in June of 09. In Feb of this year a nurse in the ER contacted me to advise me there was insulin in a bag in the fridge in the E.R. but it was a type which I was no longer using. When I asked about the other insulin she went back and looked and came back to tell me it was NOT in the bag. It is downright scary when doctors make a decision to break the law and then treat the patient like a criminal to cover up their own actions! B.C. plans to operate tourism based medical care and God help anyone who takes them up on such a plan after all the experiences I have had with Inferior Health here in B.C. I am currently waiting for a new shoulder and have been doing so since October of last year. I don’t know when or where that surgery will take place I only know that every day I go without the surgery I lose more hope of regaining full function of my dominant arm. Healthcare in B.C. is a joke just like it’s government is, afterall the Health Minister previously was Minister of the Forestry and it is his bright idea to begin offering medical tourism. 4 days in hospital would cost an American $30,000 and an ambulance trip of less than a mile would cost $580 because that is what they billed me eventhough I am a Canadian citizen! Many of the doctors at this Regional Hospital are quite inferior as well and are disgruntled with their paycut from $250,00/yr down to $165,00/yr because their on call time has been cut from being at the hospital within 20 minutes to a two hour maximum. Our medical system is broken and so will that of the U.S. if something drastic doesn’t happen to change it!