3 ms·

In Canada, can you pay out-of-pocket and go outside the government-run system?

• version_five 5y ago
  There may be some exceptions I don't know about, but generally no. For example, I went to a walk in clinic a few years ago and there was a problem with my health card. I was in a hurry and it was something that would have been only a few hundred dollars, and I asked if I could just pay for it and was told they cannot take money from anyone covered (whatever that means) from our provincial healthcare plan. So I had to leave and go to the provincial authority to renew my card before a doctor could see me. A second example, a friend of mine needed an MRI and went to the US (we were near a border at the time) to get it done immediately there. It would have been 6 months or something here. It's not all bad, I have had diagnostics and procedures done very quickly at times, but you have no control over it - who does it, how long you wait, etc. That's what I think may lead to worse outcomes overall.