Studio Medico - 23 gennaio, 2014

Finding a family doctor has been on my "to do" list for the past three months. Today, I went from being fairly  frustrated with a system that has seemed inaccessible to me to heading home from my appointment with the Doctor's home phone number in my pocket. As expats, we are square pegs here trying to fit into the round holes of a country with a National Health Service. Even though Italy has the most physicians per capita of any other country, no one seemed to be able to tell us how to find a doctor who would take private insurance.

I put the all-call out to every English speaking person I knew here and one person responded with the name of her physician who she likes but she wasn't sure whether he spoke English. By this time, I had decided that finding a competent physician who is willing to see us, trumps his or her ability to speak English. If necessary, I figured I could resort to charades to act out my symptoms. I was excited to see that his "studio" (what they call the office of a professional physician, attorney, etc) is less than .5 kilometer from our apartment. I walked over to speak to the receptionist because this kind of conversation is not yet within the range of my limited telephone Italian.  I was pleasantly surprised to find out that yes, he would take us on as patients and she scheduled both Dave and I for an appointment for the evening of the next day. A doctor who makes evening appointments ... now that's a novel idea.

                                       

As Dave and I walked over to the studio, we realized we had no idea what to expect. We were the only ones in the spacious waiting room and the receptionist was gone. There were no nurses or assistants and the doctor himself summoned us to his office. The office had a desk with chairs next to a fully set up examining table. He introduced us to a young male doctor in training and the four of us sat around his desk while he spoke with us in Italian and attempted to take our medical history. Luckily the younger man was able to translate some of the words and terminology and thankfully, since Dave and I are both in good health, the conversation was fairly short.

Then the doctor looked at me and said, "togliersi i vestiti" which means.... "get undressed". There was no gown, no sheet, no little room divider - just three men and me. Now to be honest, I had been warned by others that this is how it is done in Europe; everyone is more comfortable with nudity or partial nudity and they don't waste time in getting to it!  So I laughed to myself and decided that "when in Rome, do as the Romans do" and stripped down. 

As the exam progressed and then David's, I noticed that our doctor was beginning to be more comfortable trying to speak in English as we were also doing better with our Italian vocabulary. He pronounced us both in good health and updated my medication prescription. Ironically, the neighbor pharmacist had been giving me monthly supplies of my Benicar without a prescription since I had run out 3 months ago. The pharmacists here function more like Nurse Practitioners do in the U.S. with some diagnosing and prescribing authority. The cost of my medication  per month is about 25% of what it costs (without insurance) in the U.S.  Italians covered under the National Health Service pay only about 2 Euro for each prescription. As we got ready to leave, the Doctor wrote his email address and home phone number on a piece of paper for us. He invited us to communicate via email if we needed a prescription or office visit but also told us we could call if we were very sick and needed him to come for a home visit. Yes, I guess they still do make house calls in Como.

Neighborhood pharmacy across the street from our apartment