<story><title>How Taiwan transformed its health care system</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/26/upshot/the-leap-to-single-payer-what-taiwan-can-teach.html?referer=</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>peterburkimsher</author><text>Culture helps - everyone here wants to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer.&lt;p&gt;Taiwanese doctors don&amp;#x27;t get paid in money.&lt;p&gt;They get paid &amp;quot;credits&amp;quot; which have to be exchanged for money based on a parallel financial system.&lt;p&gt;Foreigners here sometimes complain that there&amp;#x27;s a focus on seeing more patients faster, so there might be a misdiagnosis or a less thorough examination.&lt;p&gt;The fact remains though - it&amp;#x27;s cheaper to fly here to have a wisdom tooth removed (without insurance) than the same operation would cost in Switzerland or the US. There isn&amp;#x27;t much resentment of medical tourism either - so, you&amp;#x27;re all welcome to visit!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>xwvvvvwx</author><text>&amp;gt; &lt;i&gt;Taiwanese doctors don&amp;#x27;t get paid in money.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; &lt;i&gt;They get paid &amp;quot;credits&amp;quot; which have to be exchanged for money based on a parallel financial system.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;This is really interesting. Had a quick google and couldn’t find anything. Do you have a link with more details?</text></comment>
<story><title>How Taiwan transformed its health care system</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/26/upshot/the-leap-to-single-payer-what-taiwan-can-teach.html?referer=</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>peterburkimsher</author><text>Culture helps - everyone here wants to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer.&lt;p&gt;Taiwanese doctors don&amp;#x27;t get paid in money.&lt;p&gt;They get paid &amp;quot;credits&amp;quot; which have to be exchanged for money based on a parallel financial system.&lt;p&gt;Foreigners here sometimes complain that there&amp;#x27;s a focus on seeing more patients faster, so there might be a misdiagnosis or a less thorough examination.&lt;p&gt;The fact remains though - it&amp;#x27;s cheaper to fly here to have a wisdom tooth removed (without insurance) than the same operation would cost in Switzerland or the US. There isn&amp;#x27;t much resentment of medical tourism either - so, you&amp;#x27;re all welcome to visit!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ImaCake</author><text>I have encounted free general practice doctor places in Australia that operate on seeing as many patients as possible. Basically useless if you have a difficult to diagnose problem, but very useful for getting a referal, a script for a pill, or antibiotics.</text></comment>