International Students' Life; Coping with American Health Insurance System

International Students’ Life; Coping with American Health Insurance System

In the middle of Friday night, 19-year-old CSUN student April Hong woke up from her sleep. Her pillows and bed sheets were covered with her sweats. She merely could speak and it was too hard for her to get out of the bed and make phone calls to someone who can save her life. She struggles in her bed to get up and she feels that there’s something wrong with her body. April barely walks over to her living room and grabs her cell phone. That moment, she is too scared to call 911 because her English is not that fluent. April starts to search her phone book, but there’s nobody she can call. All of her family members are in Korea thinking that April will be living a fantastic life in America but in reality, she is an international student who is new to everything that is going on in the states. She doesn’t even have a friend who can come and help her and she is too scared to call for an ambulance. Will poor April survive?
All international students are required to purchase a health insurance program through schools they are enrolled in. if they don’t buy the insurance, they cannot register for classes. Healthcare is important especially when someone is studying in a foreign country so it is not a problem that many of the international students purchase health insurance through their schools. The problem is after they purchase it. The main issue about health insurance coverage for international students comes to be either “is it worth it?” or “do I know how to use it when I really need it?” unfortunately, most of international students don’t have the answer for any of this question.
April Hong still wasn’t sure what to do. She had so much fever, she couldn’t move her body easily. However, she waited at her apartment until next morning. Because it was only her first semester at American university, she thought it would be much easier to speak to a Korean doctor. She took out a Korean yellow page book and started to dial the numbers of Korean doctors’ offices. She picked a hospital in Korea town with a huge advertisement on the book. She called and explained to a nurse that she is an international student from Korea and wants to see a doctor immediately. The nurse on the phone said April has to wait for two weeks to see a doctor and her insurance is not covered at their hospital. “But I purchased it through my school and it is a $800 insurance!” shouted April. The nurse hung up the phone after she had said she has nothing to say. April didn’t give up and called five other Korean hospitals but none of them said they could cover April with her insurance. While she was talking to the nurses, her pains got worse and she eventually went to an urgent center in Northridge. At the urgent center, she had to wait for almost two hours and got to see a doctor for 30 seconds. Fortunately, she was covered by her insurance at the urgent center but that wasn’t the end of the problem. April brought her prescription to the nearest pharmacy and there, she had to wait for another hour because the nobody at the pharmacy knew for sure if April’s health insurance would covers the pharmacy costs. April showed her identification and her health insurance card, but it was no use. She ended up paying almost $100 for the medication. How long did it take April to make phone calls, visit an urgent center, and finally get the medication she needed? All day. April came back home around seven at night and she got even sicker. She did not understand why it is so complicated to see a doctor in America when she still pays $800 a year for her health insurance.
Christina Choe, another international student from Korea is planning to visit her home country during this winter break. She has all of her family members living with her in the states but she still paid $1,300 for a plane ticket to Korea. “I’m going to Korea every year to get medical examination,” Choe said. According to Choe, all of her family members fly to Korea almost every year for medical check-up. Because her family immigrated to the states only a few years ago, they don’t have green card yet which forces them to pay unreasonable amount of money for health insurance. “It takes money and time to go to Korea, but I can get medical check-ups at relatively inexpensive price which I can’t even dream about in America. It may cost twice or even three times more to get overall check-ups in the states than Korea, so I’d rather pay for air fair. That’s more worth it” Choe said.
It is not hard to find an international student suffering from health care problem. Due to its high cost and complicated procedures, lots of international students like Christina fly back to their homelands despite all the inconveniences to receive health care with less expense.
“Most medical treatments are available just by making appointments at school health center but international students seems to avoid it” said Sharon Aronoff, student health administrator at CSUN. “Students might have to wait till the next day if the center of closed or it may take several days to actually receive treatment even though students make appointments” she explained about some of the inconveniences students can encounter when utilizing student health center. Despite some of the inconveniences, Aronoff still believes the student health center on campus is the best place to come when a student is ill. “The center provides free medications and treatments for nearly any student who attends CSUN which may be the safest, cheapest, and the most useful way for international students to get medical treatments in America” Sharon added.
Susan Chung, a pediatric psychiatrist at Kaiser Permanente recently had a patient with a heart-breaking story. “I got to treat a child whose parents were the international students. The parents could hardly afford the cost of therapies for their child and their health insurance wouldn’t cover the cost, so they finally applied for Medicaid program which is built to benefit the poor” said Chung. Psychiatric treatments are known to cost a lot of money, time, and effort. This poor international student couple still had to pay for $3,000 for family health insurance and got nothing out of it. “Maybe it’s the best to treat their daughter in Korea rather than suffering all these problems here,” said Dr. Chung with somewhat bitter smile.
Kee-Hoon Shin has been running an oriental medical clinic in Northridge ever since he immigrated to the states 30 years ago. “It even feels sad to be ill in a foreign country, and if students do not receive proper treatments at pharmacies or hospitals, who would feel like staying in America to study anymore?” he expressed what he had on his mind. He additionally explained about America’s health insurance reality. “When someone rings a hospital to make an appointment, the nurse tells the patient which insurances are accepted and which insurances are not. Some of the doctor’s offices even require a patient to come in to the office first and then let the patient know whether he or she is covered or not” said Shin. Isn’t it funny that hospitals ask a patient to drive all the way to the hospitals and then send the patient back home when their computer tells them they can’t accept this patient’s insurance?
Cindy Lee, a nurse at a local dermatology office argues that the reason why some of the doctor’s offices don’t accept international students’ health insurance is because the procedure is so complicated. “We try to treat international students with respect, but almost every international student’s insurance has no coverage for dermatology treatment,” said Lee. According to Lee, many of the hospitals require certain amount of deposit to patients just in case their insurances don’t cover the fee. “We bill the insurance company after we treat patients, and sometimes the company wouldn’t pay for the treatment. Then, we have to bill patients again which makes all these procedures too complicated for us” Lee explained about the reason why some hospitals don’t want to deal with international students.
Most international students return to their home countries after several years of studying in the states. When they go back and recall America, the memories about hospitals or health insurance may not be very beautiful to them.