My experience at Thomas Jefferson University

Thanks to this program, I learned a lot about medicine in America and enjoyed Philadelphia very much. Thomas Jefferson University has a lot of great medical staff, wonderful buildings, and a very large skills simulation center. I was very surprised at the scale of Thomas Jefferson University. In Japan, there is no such a large hospital. I don’t think that medical students and doctors in America are better than those in Japan. But hospital facilities and help of hospital staff are greater. I found a lot of differences of medical system between Japan and America, so now I show you two things. Medical interviews and medical insurance problems.

First, I was very impressed with medical interview skills of doctors in America. They are very kind to patients and do a 30 minutes medical interview with not only new patients but also follow-up patients. Their medical interviews are very polite and very long. In Japan, we don’t have much time, so we can't do such a long medical interview. I wondered why. So I asked Dr. Sato, and he told me that their pay depended on quality of their medical interview and their clinical skills. There is an incentive to work hard. This is a major difference between Japan and America.

Second, I saw actual scenes of medical insurance problems. A certain patient had an allergy to some drugs, so she needed another drug, but she could not buy the drug because of her insurance. I think this problem will occur in Japan. Japan now has very sever financial problems, so we can’t keep the medical insurance for the whole nation. Doctors in Japan will face the same hardship as doctors in America in medical insurance problems.

Finally, I had a great experience at Thomas Jefferson University. I learned a lot of important things about medicine in America. I need to be a good doctor with good medical interview skills and clinical skills. Thank you very much for efforts of all staff and doctors in America and Japan. I will go back to America soon.