Costalegre Community Message Board

Unfortunately, medicine has become more of a business that the desire to cure so figured this is where I need to post. I'm brand new to the forum so I dont know if anyone has every inquired before, but what is the availability of medical care in and around Melaque? My wife and I are looking to retire in Mexico and dont want to be in a huge city but because of our ages, medical care is always a concern. I would appreciate info on the subject.

Based on my limited experience with medical care in this area, I can say that the emphasis is still on CARE and hasn't -- yet -- been reduced to a business.

There's a centro de salud (health center) in Melaque, a 24/7 (mas o menos) clinic in Cihuatlan, and a couple of very good hopsitals in Manzanillo.

Foreigners have two options: Pay as you go (and pay a whole lot less than you would in the U.S.) and visit private doctors and pay for your prescriptions. Or sign up for IMSS, the national health system aka social seguro, and office visits and prescriptions are no charge. I believe you need an FM-3 for the latter. I've heard that private medical insurance coverage also is available, through which you can be sent back to the U.S. for critical surgery.

Thanks for the info Jane, very helpful. This is the friendliest and most helpful Message Forum I've seen yet.

Having jsut experienced a medical problem, here is my 2¢ worth.

I had a ambulance come ot the house in Melaque early in the morning as I was having big time trouble breathing, oxygen in the ambulance right away. They took me to the Red Cross in Cihuatlan and I was checked out, in the ambulance, and diagnosed with a bad case of bronchitas. Then they called hospitals in Manzanillo but asked me first if I wanted state hospital or private. I said private and they said English speaking and I said yes. Then the ambulance took me to Pacifico Medico Hospital, in Manzanillo, to the emergency room. I stayed in there one day and then was transfereed to a private room,

All the doctors spoke English there. The doctors checked on me every two hours and I was given lots of IV stuff and breathing treatments. Three days there and I went home.

Cost for the ambulance from Melque to Manzanillo with the stop and immediate diagnosis at Cihuatlan Red Cross was $300 pesos. Cheaper than a taxi from Manzanillo back. I wanted to take the ambulance back but could not figure out a way to do that. Taxi was $350 pesos.

The hospital total costs including the doctors and everything else; $9038 pesos. They took visa and most other charge cards.

Not too bad in my opinion and everything was first rate.

Hope that gives you a idea what you get down here.

cya,
shoe

imss takes 3 yrs for full benefits. first yr is doctor visits for minor stough and it must be in imss clinic. 2nd yr more stough is included[i forgot which] and 3rd year is drugs,surgery, hospital, etc.
you must always use imss facilities including their hospitals[big noisy wards].
cost: around $600/yr and you must have an fm3. existing medical problems won't be covered except "maybe" after 3rd year.
to chose your own doc-the cost is only about $13-25/visit including house calls and sometimes drugs, so pay that out of pocket.[drugs are cheaper in mex than the usa and even sometimes canada.]
private health care for major stough[surgery, hospital, etc.] will cost about
$1500/yr.
you won't have to go to the exited states fer this major stough as there are world class facilities in guadalajara and mexico city.
most specialists have some training [or all] in the usa, canada, etc.
we are moving to mexico from canada and it all sounds good to us.
i ain't had a house call since i were 7 yrs. old.

I moved this to better match the content. Even tho this was a Melaque related question it's not untypical of what you'll find in much of Mexico.

I was eligible for all the IMSS services from the get go -- their doctors, specialists (all of whom have practices in the private sector), hospital, surgery, prescriptions, etc. I didn't have the option of going to a private hospital, and my doctors spoke limited, if any, English, but their care and attention were, for the most part, excellent. For anyone with a major medical problem and limited Spanish, however, I strongly suggest seeking treatment with a doctor who has a good command of the English language.

may i ask how you managed to get the full imss coverage including hospitalization surgery and no cost drugs without going through the 3 stages, jane g?
or are you lucky like a friend of mine who lives in a small pueblo[about 50 miles from guad] which has a 4 bed clinic serviced by doctors from guad. only the actual residents of the pueblo are eligable.

Thanks again to everyone who replied. I've travelled extensively but at government expense so I had no worries about medical care in the past. Looking forward to visiting your part of paradise in the future.

We have IMSS coverage and have had full coverage from the start of the insurance. I've never heard of three stage IMSS, doesn't mean it does not exist, just that it is not what we have.

My insurance is $1830 pesos a year because I am over 40 and Enrique's is $1230 pesos a year because he is under 40. So even together we pay nothing near $6000 pesos a year or $600 pesos a year -- Pedro doesn't say if the $600 he cites is in pesos or dollars.

Our IMSS will never cover any pre-existing conditions but we didn't have any to start with, we were healthy when we signed up, so that is no big deal. It sounds like Pedro has completely different IMSS insurance than we have, even the price is very different. I know that the price jumps again at 60 or 65 years-of-age perhaps that's when the three stage waiting period at the start comes into play as well?

Who knows, we live in Barra de Navidad not a little community outside of Guadalajara with a private clinic.

I had a very good experience a couple of years back with the Hospital Medica Pacifica when an older neighbour who had emphysema (spelling?) took a fall and we took him into them for both a possible broken hip and the emphysema problem that had caused the fall. They were great with him and he was there for about three days with meds and X-rays for about $700 USD. When we arrived about 9:00 pm in the ambulance from the Cihuatlan Cruz Roja no one at Medico Pacifico spoke english but I translated so it was okay. When they found out that I was not staying but planned to actually return home that night they got on the phone and called in a young Doc who spoke excellent English and also the director, Dr. Jorge Alvarado Pérez came in. He spoke english with the neighbour/patient and spanish with me, he told me that he prefers to speak spanish, but his english was excellent. I recommend them. Ed can't as he passed a couple of years later -- nothing to do with them -- but I am sure he would if he was still around.

Medica Pacifica numbers are 01-314-333-3047 and 01-314-334-0385 celular 01-314-353-0110 and they are the first private hospital on Blvd M de la Madrid that you come to from our area. They are just after the entrance to the Santiago Penninsula (where las Hadis is) on the other side of M de la Madrid.

Tracye at the Crazy Cactus in Barra, 355-6099 sells some sort of private health insurance down here.

yes indeed nan i am an old fart and the cost to me is roughly $600 usd and is in 3 stages. i also have pre-existing thingies and so does the www.
i am not living in mexico yet but i have assembled a huge file on medcare and even have the application forms and rules, etc. for imss.
the first thing we looked at about moving to mexico when we got serious about it over 4 years ago was climate and the second thing was healthcare.[3rd thing fer me was finding a place ta continue playing hockey]
when ya get ta be old as dirt health care is very important.
sounds like the clinics around you are marvy! but can you go to them with imss coverage. my friend in the pueblo had a serious incident and had to stay in the clinic for 2 days and including meds paid $3 usd.
unfortunately in and around guad it's not the same because of the larger population. some of the infrastructure is in disrepair and the staff although excellent are hugely overworked and morale is low in the larger hospitals in guad. so we are still up in the air on imss coverage or private which will cost us more but maybe give us peace of mind.
i'm not out ta scare any newbies but i got good advice re this topic from long term residents when we started our research - i didn' want ta look at such an important thing through rose coloured glasses.
when i were in my 40's my bod was way better than it is now-happens when ya gets older-jeje! since june my back went south 4 times but i only missed playing 2 games o' hockey.

I figured it must be an age thing with the coverage stipulations and annual cost you were talking about from IMSS being so different when compared to our coverage and what we pay annually. Obviously the actuaries set the rates here too and the older one is...

We can go to any of the IMSS clinics and hospitals in Mexico for no charge with our coverage. Our closest IMSS clinic/hospital is in Villa Obregon and that is where we go for standard doctor visits. However, for emergencies we can go directly to the brand new IMSS facility in Manzanillo if we want to. Enrique is Mexican and I have lived in Mexico full time for 8 years now so the coverage is handy for us because it works all over Mexico. I fell ill in San Blas in early November while travelling and the IMSS Urgencias department fixed me right up, all meds included. The doc had never seen a foreigner with coverage before though and when I handed him my IMSS book he told me that he could help me but that I couldn't use someone elses coverage and would have to pay $450 pesos. I showed him my picture on the back of the book and my name inside it and he treated me for no cost -- no problem -- he was just surprised.

One thing to consider is that I've not encountered anyone fluent in english in any of my dealings with IMSS. This is not a concern for me but if one were not able to communicate well in spanish that might be a problem. I've never been ill enough to go to one of the big hospitals in Guadalajara though, they may have some english speaking doctors there.

The State operated Jalisco and Colima Centros de Salud and Hospitals Civil also provide low cost medical treatment without insurance.

Has anyone had any experience in the IMSS hospital in Colima? We were told it is a level 3. Anyone have an address or directions?

Here's a list of hospitals in Colima - maybe best to call first

http://www.hotelesdemexico.com.mx/a_web ... les_us.htm

I don't know level 3 but they have strong connections with the University Medical school

Thanx Sparks for your quick response.