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I’ve searched for the answer and came up blank. Maybe I’m searching wrong. It seems like the answer should be here.
Anyway, how much does the required Caja that covers healthcare cost? My landlord, who’s interested in CR, asked and I couldn’t answer. HELP!
it{s different for everyone because it{s based on your income, unless you join ARCR and then you get their flat’rate program which is about $50 a month. otherwise it{s 13% of your income if you do it on your own. my husband and i pay $38 a month for the two of us.
If you are a member of ARCR, http://www.arcr.net/, for which you pay an annual fee, you will be charged approx.n $45 or approx. $55 if you are under 55, so then you pay towards a small pension.
If you ‘go it alone’ it will depend on your income, so it could be $30-$150 per month or even more
You must be a legal resident to join CAJA.[quote=”costaricafinca”]If you are a member of ARCR, http://www.arcr.net/, for which you pay an annual fee, you will be charged approx.n $45 or approx. $55 if you are under 55, so then you pay towards a small pension.
If you ‘go it alone’ it will depend on your income, so it could be $30-$150 per month or even more
You must be a legal resident to join CAJA.[/quote]i pay 14000 $28 per month for me.. why because truthfully its a waste of time so i just pay the min since i would not trust the caja. its a great idea but is a broken system.
better off going to a decent place like metropolitana hosp.. good service and reasonably priced.
[quote=”fredo”]I’ve searched for the answer and came up blank. Maybe I’m searching wrong. It seems like the answer should be here.
Anyway, how much does the required Caja that covers healthcare cost? My landlord, who’s interested in CR, asked and I couldn’t answer. HELP![/quote]
Some are saying it is a percentage of income but I find that to be untrue.
For my wife we pay 15,125 colones or about $30 to $31 per month. For myself we pay 32,250 colones or about $65 per month. This is somewhat under 1/4 of the 13% others claim.
I would think you landlord will pay under $100 per month.
Aside from the normal preventive care with appointments every six months my wife was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer in January 2009 and just got out of the hospital after a series of heart attacks while I had bad run with appendicitis, peritonitis, hernia and septic infection.
My wife is cancer free and recovering from putting three stents in her heart veins while I am recovering nicely and will go back to have the abdominal wall strengthened in July.
My wife’s coronary surgeon is among the best in the world and has a private pracice as well as doing heart surgery for CAJA.There is no additional cost for clinic visits, hospitalization or any generic meds. If you require meds that have no generic equivalent they can be bought through the local pharmacies or ordered from the States.
We are totally happy with CAJA and I see it being as good or better than what you get in the States.
[quote=”costaricafinca”] You must be a legal resident to join CAJA.[/quote]
As of April 1, 2010 you must join CAJA before you submit your documents for residency. They are now looking for your cedula and proof of current payment.
I believe it is a percentage of your income but, you don’t have to prove your income and can claim you earn whatever you wish…
There is also no communication between various government agencies so the CAJA has no way of verifying your income.
I know Tico professionals earning US$20,000 per month and as far as the CAJA is concerned, they only make $500 per month ….
This is clearly not sustainable and changes will have to be made at some time in the future..
Scott
Legal residents of Costa Rica (as opposed to perpetual tourists) can join the CAJA through the Association of Residents of Costa Rica for $49US per month if over 55 years old. Under age 55, it’s around $10 per month more.
[quote=”Scott”]I believe it is a percentage of your income but, you don’t have to prove your income and can claim you earn whatever you wish…[/quote]
If this is true the percentage of income as of April 2010 when I joined Caja would be a little more than 4%. When my wife joined in May 2009 they charged her just over 2%.
If you want to know the truth I don’t think they have any standards.
I had to get Caja to renew my residency within the last few months. They asked for my pension income documents and calculated the Caja to be 6.3% of my monthly income from the pension document. This was at the Caja in Santa Cruz.
The Caja doctors in this area are out of date on most medical related topics. The good news is that there are private doctors who are authorized to do Caja work.
The general statement that CR doctors and Caja doctors are as good as USA doctors is just not true.
there are some pretty out of date US doctors, too. i think it depends on where you live here in Costa Rica. I have neighbors who have some very complicated medical issues, including MS, and they have gotten exemplary care from the CAJA and the doctors there. I had to educate my doctor in the states more than once on the risks of certain medications, which he was told by the pharam rep were perfectly safe. in my experience, you had better be pretty educated about your own medical conditions rather than trusting any doctor implicitly (unless of course you’ve been hit by a bus!)
[quote=”Bill55″] The general statement that CR doctors and Caja doctors are as good as USA doctors is just not true.[/quote]
That has not been my experience.
Preventive care is top notch with clinic visits scheduled every six months.
My wife was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer and treated through Caja and is cancer free with follow-up visits every four months.
Three weeks ago my wife was suffering heart attacks and had three stents implanted and is recovering nicely.
We never have a problem in being referred to a specialist when it is needed.I was covered by Kaiser-Permanente in the States and the care here is equal to the care we received in the States if not superior.
Medical treatment is the #3 cause of death in the States:
Medical Errors – A Leading Cause of Death
The JOURNAL of the AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) Vol 284, No 4, July 26th 2000 article written by Dr Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH, of the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health, shows that medical errors may be the third leading cause of death in the United States.
The report apparently shows there are 2,000 deaths/year from unnecessary surgery; 7000 deaths/year from medication errors in hospitals; 20,000 deaths/year from other errors in hospitals; 80,000 deaths/year from infections in hospitals; 106,000 deaths/year from non-error, adverse effects of medications – these total up to 225,000 deaths per year in the US from iatrogenic causes which ranks these deaths as the # 3 killer. Iatrogenic is a term used when a patient dies as a direct result of treatments by a physician, whether it is from misdiagnosis of the ailment or from adverse drug reactions used to treat the illness. (drug reactions are the most common cause).
=============================================
Death from “Iatrogenic Causes” – the third largest cause of death in the USA!
The medical establishment has a few possible choices as to how to deal with this issue. They could, for example, fix the problems that are killing so many patients. Or, they could learn more about natural medicines. We work in the jungle in Costa Rica, and are watching an indigenous curandero cure Americans who come here with many forms of cancer, hepatitis, diabetes, and most recently using medicinal plants to force a man’s leukemia into remission.
Apparently, however, the path the medical and drug industry has chosen is now on its way to implementation in the European Union. Their choice appears to be – make the competition illegal! And you can rest assured that there will be implementation of related laws in the USA, and Canada, and elsewhere if such a ban is allowed to go into effect in Europe.
An excellent explanation of this situation is made in an audiovisual presentation on this website: http://www.savenaturalhealth.eu/
and, this website also provides a place to sign a petition against this “draconian directive”. When I check this morning, they had well over 350,000 signatures.Listen to the short presentation, and if you feel comfortable, sign the petition against the implementation of this law.
They say they need “hundreds of thousands of signatures”.
SIGNATURES ARE NEEDED ON THE PETITION FOUND AT http://www.savenaturalhealth.eu/
Second part of post written by Barry Stevens.
I love the part about the medication errors, and yet they want to outlaw anything that isn’t made by Big Pharma. I’ve watched as the Codex Alimentarius took hold in Europe (i’ve been fighting this since 1993), and as the EU goes, so goes the US, and the rest of the world.
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