I moved to Beijing in February after retiring from a 40 year career in academic orthopedic surgery at Columbia in New York City. I moved to work full time for my team at JuniperMD a medical startup and International Healthcare Leadership a not for profit organization dedicated to healthcare management and clinical education in China.
It is the end of my first month in Beijing and Saturday was a perfectly beautiful spring day. The sky was blue and clear – I could see the West Mountains from my window when I got up Saturday Morning. Beijing is starting to open up as the Covid19 crisis ends. There is more traffic, there are more pedestrians. Restaurants and stores are opening – appropriate and timely for spring, the flower that is Beijing is reopening after the quarantine. I was on my way to meet my entire Beijing JuniperMD team at the subway stop for the Summer Palace. Our plan was to have a team building event on the grounds of the Summer Palace and to see the cherry trees, plum trees, peach trees all in bloom. We had a great day with team competitions and a marvelous lunch at the tea house adjacent to the Summer Palace sitting outdoors around the fish pond. Once the day was finished, we took a few more group photos then headed for the subway once again. That’s when things went wrong. After a long day of hiking, racing up and down stairs, scrambling up rocks, I was pretty tired. I was still keeping up with my Gen Z crew, but at the point where we changed subway lines, walking down stairs surrounded by my teammates, I fell on my right knee striking the proximal tibia hard. I saw stars. There was lancinating pain, a vasovagal reaction. I knew I had done something not good to that 73 year old knee. But, I wasn’t going to lose face with my young colleagues. I got up and kept walking to the subway. For a moment I thought it would be OK but not so lucky. I said farewell to my colleagues a few stops later and went to dinner with the family of my young CEO. I examined myself (what any orthopedic surgeon would do!) and found some tenderness but very little swelling. We applied Chinese Traditional Medicine patches and ice. By the time we left dinner I really couldn’t walk so we borrowed grandmother’s wheelchair to get downstairs to the car. At this point it’s late Saturday night and I am not about to go to an emergency room. I called a friend at Chao Yang Hospital here in Beijing and made an appointment with one of his colleagues for Sunday afternoon. I didn’t know what to expect. I have spent years working her on an intermittent basis but I have never been a patient in a Chinese 3A hospital. Beijing hospitals are opening for the spring as well – as of this week, elective patients are being seen and surgery performed. Despite this the hospital was really quiet. Very few people in the hallways and no one in the waiting rooms, no lines. The hospital was very clean. The clinic staff was professional, courteous and efficient. There were two doctors in the orthopedic clinic and there and a constant flow of patients, but no one waiting – really efficient. I saw the doctor, he examined me and he and I decide that I needed an x-ray. My first shocking event. As a “Self-Pay” patient I had to pay 50 RMB. That is approximately 7 USD. If the doctor friend who referred me to his clinic were in New York and I referred him to one of our sports medicine doctors for care he would have had to pay 500 USD! I went to x-ray. It took me less than a minute to register and pay (with my phone of course, my WeChat platform something I can’t do in the USA) and the computer directed me to a room (no people) where x-rays were completed in minutes. The x-ray was the second shock – 120 RMB or about 17 USD. In New York City it would be about 300 USD with two components, the technical component (taking the x-ray) and the “professional” component which is the reading of the x-ray by the radiologist. I walked back to my doctor and he and I decided there was a minor fracture and we discussed the treatment which consists of pain management, exercise and activity modification. I felt much relieved that I knew what it was. And to reassure my friends I am already much better and back in the trenches today. I was so impressed by the care I received and how professional efficient and reasonable it was, how technologically advanced it was – amazing value.
The Chao Yang Hospital charged me 170 RMB. My Chinese orthopedic friend being seen in New York would have paid 5600 RMB (800 USD). That is 33X more! That is 3300 % more! You can see why this injury was shocking. I can add this to the list of reasons for being happy that I moved to China.
Read this article on LinkedIn.
The Summer Palace.