Expat Community > Colombia

JustSomeGuy
Joined 2018
Posts: 1092

Cuts and bruises

Tuesday

I tore my skin earlier today. I guess I’m kind of hard on my hands. I cut myself pretty good a few days ago pulling wires but I’m used to cuts and they weren’t unusually bad. But tearing the skin is out of the ordinary and it gushed blood and at first I thought I’d torn a vein. It was pretty dirty, of course, so after washing it I used pressure to stop the bleeding. When I looked at it after it was clear I noticed there was a flattened vein. In retrospect, of course it was flat, I’d just squeezed it for a couple minutes but I didn’t think it through and thought I’d damaged it. So I went to a pharmacy to get a professional opinion and some advice. They told me I’d have to go to the hospital for that, so off I went.
At the hospital they asked for an ID, I gave them my expired cédula, that worked for them. Then a woman took me to see a man who I believe was a doctor. He looked at it, asked me about it, said a lot of things I didn’t understand and told me to go with the woman. She took me to a room and washed the wound and told me to stay there and left. She came back with a syringe and gave me a tetanus shot. Then the wound was washed two more times by different people. I was the only customer and I suppose they didn’t have anything else to do. Then they gave me a prescription for an antibiotic told me we were done. So I walked to the front desk and asked for a bill. They told me there was no bill. I think they said the insurance took care of everything. I told them I was a tourist and had no insurance. They disagreed. They said something about Salud Total. I assured them I had no insurance as I had never asked for insurance or paid for insurance. They said lots of things but the bottom line was they were not going to take any money from me.
If they figure out they made a mistake and I do owe them some money they know where to find me, I walk past the hospital a few times a day. But I am curious about it. Is this how the system is designed to work?

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