MEDICARE provides provincial health card to legal residents of Canada. It is a plastic identification card, similar to credit card. The health care system available to all persons who are residents of province or territory including Canadian Armed Forces but do not include inmates. When the health card is issued it can be used to make visits with physicians or health care providers.
These cards contain identification numbers allowing a person’s medical information being accessed. Patients have the option to choose the physicians/ specialist they would see.
They can have immediate care even without appointment at any hospital emergency room or community health clinic. The Canadian hospitals are non-profit institutions, however with independent administrative boards. Government control is less on these hospitals, though these hospitals depend on public funds for their operating costs.
The provincial health pals cover all medically necessary services includes incidental costs even transportation. MEDICARE does not cover, however, eye surgery, cosmetic surgery, and reverse sterilization, IVF etc.