Welcome one and all! Let me take you on a little adventure to an international clinic in Phu Quoc. Pull up a chair and grab some popcorn, because kiddos, this was one heck of a trip.
John and I recently visited a water park—which I’ve covered at length in another blog post. Two days later, I woke up to the sound of birds chirping outside our 15th-floor window—and a surprise: my throat was swollen, covered in white spots, and I had a fever. A fun little gift from the universe! After an eventful call with my insurance for a guarantee of payment—shoutout to Kayla from Pennsylvania—we booked a Grab to VinMec Phu Quoc International Hospital. The entire ride, my nose ran like a faucet under my mask, turning into a comedy sketch as I watched the countryside pass by while my upper lip got progressively wetter. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any tissues.
We arrived at the hospital at 3 p.m. Our driver, who had been oddly insistent that we call him when we were done, pulled up to the bay doors like our personal ambulance service. He originally thought we were Russian and, using Google Translate, asked in Russian if he could charge us for both trips. We explained (via John’s translation app in Vietnamese) that we had no idea how long the visit would take—maybe an hour, maybe five. Despite this, he had John take a picture of his WhatsApp number. It all felt a little sketchy, so we decided against contacting him later.
With a quick “thank you, buh-bye,” we slid out of the car and stepped through the automatic hospital doors. The entrance was eerily quiet. The building sat just off the main road, with an overhang reminiscent of a carriage bay—only here, it functioned as a small ambulance bay. Inside, we found an open-plan hospital layout. The waiting room seamlessly connected to two hallways: one leading to patient rooms labeled “Procedure Room,” “Triage Room,” “Isolation Room,” and “High Care Room,” while the other contained trauma beds and curtained-off emergency room wards. The front desk resembled that of a dentist’s office—no protective glass, just a wrap-around desk cluttered with papers, a printer, and a water cooler. The waiting area featured a row of high-backed benches and additional seating behind them. Off to the side, a patient-accessible water cooler lived—a necessity since the tap water here is undrinkable due to high levels of heavy metals and a lack of large-scale filtration. We’ve been relying on 5-liter bottled water, which is cheap but, unfortunately, also single-use plastic. There’s nothing like the lack of something to make you appreciate what you had, and for me that’s been well water.
John took a seat while I approached the unoccupied front desk attendant to check in. She greeted me with, “What is your problem?” I thought, Lady, so many things. But specifically today? “I’m sick, and I don’t know with what—I need a general consultation.” She handed me paperwork to fill out, but the pens were attached to the desk, so I had to complete while she watched me the whole time. Since my handwriting was a mess, she rewrote my email, asking for clarification on a few letters. I mentioned that my insurance had sent a guarantee of payment ahead of time, and she replied, “Okay, we check for you. Sit down. Wait for doctor.”
So, I did. I plopped down on the cushioned bench to watch the action as I waited for my name to be called. To my right sat a Russian father and his daughter, who looked like they’d been there for a while—the daughter curled up against him, her little feet tucked onto the bench. Behind me, a family spoke loudly in Russian on their phones. This became a theme—people speaking loudly to their insurance companies in various languages. As one of the largest international clinics on the island, VinMec attracts travelers from all over.
The waiting room and hospital in general were a swirl of activity. Through the archway to the “Procedure Room,” a few metal chairs lined the space, along with one lone office swivel chair. A blonde woman sat in it, her husband standing beside her, both waiting for something. Meanwhile, three individuals speaking Chinese continuously walked from the ward to the long-term room, outside, and back again. A tall man in a white shirt, whose voice resembled Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s in Moana, paced while talking urgently on his phone. A woman in sweats, sunglasses, and a sparkling handbag meandered the same route, occasionally stopping to speak with him. The way she paced reminded me of a robot, walking the same path it was programmed to, with no deviations.
A hospital worker in blue scrubs carried a clear box filled with blood collection tubes, disappearing around corners and reappearing again like a wandering NPC in a video game. Meanwhile, a man in his late 20s sat on a drape-covered hospital bed in the procedure room, a white chux pad under him, while his three friends joked and laughed. I could hear them from the waiting room as their door was wide open. A nurse went into the room and started bandaging some wound on the patient’s upper arm. Behind me, the constant opening and closing of the sliding entrance doors announced the arrival of new patients and friends of current ones, all navigating their own mini-dramas.
Then came my favorite moment. The blonde woman in the swivel chair suddenly perked up when a doctor in a white coat approached with x-rays in hand. In full view of the waiting room, he announced, “Yes, broken. You wait six days to be seen?!” Then he motioned her toward the triage room, where he left her to sit on a hospital bed, keeping the door open. She held her x-rays up to the fluorescent light, squinting to see the break for herself. She stayed like this for a good 20 minutes, until the doctor returned with a grey orthopedic walking boot. Meanwhile, a trainee in white scrubs wandered the floor, seemingly looking for something to do. Every so often, she’d stop at the front desk to laugh with the staff. Then, she’d bop into rooms to do, well, it wasn’t exactly clear what… The entire space buzzed with a low hum of conversation in various languages—worried voices, not excited ones.
Then, the front desk lady came over and gestured for me to go into the ward. I followed her, but as I passed the monitor desk, a doctor stopped me and asked what my problem was. I explained, and he simply said he had no beds available and told me to go sit down. The front desk attendant had already returned to her desk, seemingly unfazed by the mix-up. And, back to the bench I went, settling in to watch the drama unfold before me once more.
After an hour and a half, they finally called me and two French ladies into the triage room together. The nurse went over to the french girls and asked what was wrong.
The golden-haired one said, “I was bitten by a dog.”
The doctor asked, “When?”
“Today,” she replied.
“Yesterday?”
“No, today, today.”
“Tomorrow?”
Exasperated, she said, “Ugh, no—how do you say—aujourd’hui, aujourd’hui!”
Her friend, sitting beside her in a metal chair, clarified, “Today, 12:00.”
“Oh, today.”
The french woman gestured to her Achilles tendon where there was a slight visible redness. Then, she pulled out her yellow vaccination card, explaining that she needed three rabies shots in a certain sequence. The doctor asked where she had gotten the previous shots, and she replied, “In France.”
The nurse asked, “You got three shots?”
“No, I need three shots. I have two already.”
“Oh, okay. You wait.” The nurse left the room.
I sat on the bed next to them, trying not to look like I was listening in, but we were as close as two people riding a bus on opposite seats. Impossible not to hear. Meanwhile, the French lady kicked off her shoes, sat cross-legged on the bed, and started watching TikToks while her friend hung out beside her. I started getting that sinking feeling that I would never be seen. I watched the same group of people speaking chinese walking about—only now, there were even more of them. It looked like an entire tour bus had come to visit whoever was under medical care. A doctor appeared from the ward as the throng tried to enter, sternly saying, “No,” while gesturing them away. They turned back to the waiting room, discussing something with two women in sleek, professional all-black outfits with their hair perfectly done up. Were they part of the group? Hospital staff? I was so curious to find out. It felt like a soap opera but I didn’t have subtitles to follow along with.
Next to the triage room, there was a “Clean Room” stocked with supplies. A nurse entered but didn’t wash their hands or take any precautions. Moments later, they emerged holding a nasal cannula still in its plastic wrap. Without gloves, they tore it open and walked straight into the “long-term stay room”. Finally, a doctor came in to see me. Since I had plenty of time to wait, I had written up an explanation on my iPhone’s translation app: “I woke up and my throat hurt really bad. I have white spots, congestion, feel tired, and have a headache. I want a COVID-19 and strep test.” She nodded and gestured for me to remove my mask. After checking my ears, she looked into my throat and immediately went, “Oh!”—taking a slight step back. She then spent a solid 2 minutes listening to various parts of my heart and lungs – the most thorough exam I’ve ever had. After she was done, I asked if she had a strep test available. She replied, “We are all out of them right now, but I am 80% sure that it is strep. Your throat looks like strep. I will get antibiotics for you.” Then, before I could ask for a COVID-19 test, she left.
Coughing and with my nose running, I sat in the triage room, unsure how long it would take to get the antibiotics. The nurse returned with a vial, needle, and syringe for my roommate. She scooted back in the bed to position herself better for the shot. He asked, “Rabies shot?” She replied, “Yes.” Without wearing gloves, he opened the package containing the vial, attached the needle to the syringe, punctured the vial, drew up the vaccine, and then—without saying a word—stuck it into her arm. She didn’t seem to mind that he didn’t wear gloves or that the door was open while he did it. She was just happy to have gotten what she came for. But before she could leave, the nurse told her to wait 10 minutes to make sure she didn’t have any side effects from the vaccine. She went back to playing on her phone while her friend did the same. Every so often, sounds from TikTok reels would emanate from her screen, breaking the low hum of the waiting room. Once 10 minutes had passed, she gathered her things, slipped back on her shoes and started to head out the door. Her friend turned to me and showed me her phone. In her translation app she’d written, “feel better.” It was very sweet and in my feverish daze I forgot I could just wave or say thank you so I gave them a silly Japanese bow of thanks. I giggled a little and they did too, and then they were gone.
I remained in the triage room for another 30 minutes before a flustered-looking nurse came in and asked me to wait in the waiting room for my medication. He explained that there were many patients with stomach aches who needed to be seen. I said okay and returned to the same bench where I had started my visit, next to John. He was visibly unsettled by the whole experience, calling it chaotic and unsafe. The same group of Chinese visitors continued pacing back and forth from the long-term stay room—except this time, the entire tour bus managed to sneak past and into the room. The girl with the sparkly bag carried a bouquet of flowers and spoke in a monotone voice on her phone. Meanwhile, two EMS workers arrived with a stretcher, only to ultimately walk back out without using it.
I hadn’t heard anything about the guarantee of payment, so I went to the front desk. The unattended desk agent looked visibly upset as I approached, quickly saying, “We have emergency patient. Stroke patient. I’m busy. Go to other counter.” Then she went back to typing furiously on her computer. I thought, whoa, and went to talk to the other agent instead. I asked about my guarantee of payment from GeoBlue, and she explained that she needed to write something up and send it to them. Then, I needed to call GeoBlue myself to get a verbal acknowledgment that they had received it.
“Call,” she stated.
I tried to clarify, “Call GeoBlue?”
“Yes,” she confirmed.
At this point, I was completely confused because displayed in a stand-up case there was a guide for VinMec’s guarantee of payment procedure: Insurance sends the guarantee to VinMec, VinMec takes a deposit from the patient, the visit happens, and then after VinMec connects with GeoBlue, the patient gets their deposit back. However, when I asked about this, they simply said, “You will give a deposit,” but never actually asked me for money. It was extremely odd—no deposit had been taken, yet they were instructing me to contact GeoBlue to confirm they had received an emailed statement of my visit.
Wishing someone had explained this to me while I was waiting, I called GeoBlue and got Kayla on the phone again. She immediately said, “This is not how we do things. We already sent the guarantee of payment. Do they need us to send it again? Also, I don’t see any email from VinMec.”
Since she needed me to check, I went back to the front desk and asked the agent if they needed GeoBlue to resend the guarantee. The agent told me she hadn’t sent the email yet. I relayed this to Kayla, and as I turned around, a Russian couple had started checking in, filling out paperwork. The other desk attendant was still fending off new patients because of the emergency patient.
While the Russians were busy with their forms, I asked the front desk agent again, “Do you need GeoBlue to send the guarantee of payment again?” Instead of answering, she simply handed me my receipt and prescription slip without another word. Then, she pointed toward the ward and said, “Go there.” As I was leaving, I heard her mutter, People are asking me so many questions, looking visibly flustered. I felt bad.
I made my way over to the same desk where, earlier, a doctor had told me to return to the waiting room because there were no beds. This time, a man in blue scrubs looked at me and said, “Prescription?” I handed it to him. “Wait five minutes,” he said. So, I did—impatiently itching to get out of there, since it was now nearing 8:30 p.m. Finally, he turned around and handed me a comically large plastic bag filled with six different types of medications: medicated lozenges, Betadine, Amoxicillin sachets (for children), herbal cough medicine (for children), a medication that is not FDA-approved, and Ibuprofen. I had only wanted Amoxicillin, and I knew GeoBlue wouldn’t cover all those prescriptions, but there was no one to explain this to. Instead, they essentially shoved me out the door with a quick, “I’m sorry this took so long, bye-bye.”
So that was it. I had my many medications. John called the Grab, and I returned to my nose running like a faucet under my mask for the ride back. All in all, I do not recommend trying to be the middleman between a foreign hospital and an insurance company—especially when sick. But ultimately, the antibiotics did help, so whatever I had, I’m glad I was able to get the help I needed, even if it was chaotic and messy getting there. Reflecting on the whole experience, it seemed like the hospital was underfunded, and lacked both the space and resources to adequately support foreign patients. However, it was clear that the hospital staff were trying their best, and I’m grateful for that. If the iPhone translation app wasn’t available, I honestly don’t know what I would have done – thank goodness for modern technology.
More soon,
-W