March 18, 2024

Holiday From Hell: What To Do If You’re Injured Abroad

A trip to the hospital is always unwelcome but it’s far worse if it happens while you’re on holiday. It will spoil your trip and you won’t have a clue what you’re doing. The system is going to be different wherever you go and the language barrier can make it a real struggle to get yourself seen to. The whole process can be relatively stress free if you make the right preparations before you go and have a plan in place to deal with every eventuality. Use this prevention strategy and if the worst does happen, you’ll be ready for it.

Image Source

Insurance

Before you go traveling anywhere abroad you should get some insurance, no exceptions. Don’t be fooled into thinking that you’re saving money by skipping out on insurance. While it might save you a little bit of money now, if you have an accident or you get ill, the medical bills will outweigh that saving by a significant amount. If you need to visit a hospital and you don’t have insurance, you could easily end up paying out tens of thousands in bills.

Make sure that you get a policy that covers injury or illness abroad and 24 hour emergency care. That should cover you for any eventuality. If your holiday is going to include any kind of sporting activities like waterskiing or quad biking, make sure you get separate cover for these. A lot of standard policies won’t cover you if you sustain injury doing something potentially dangerous like this.

While you’re at it, you might as well add cancellation and theft cover to your policy as well. They are only small extra costs but they could save you a lot of money and hassle if your holiday is cancelled, or if any of your luggage is stolen. If you don’t have that cover, you’ll end up being out of pocket.

Getting Home

Hopefully, any injury or illness that you have will be minor and you’ll be able to get your normal flight home. Unfortunately, that won’t always be the case. In the event of a more serious problem, you need to have a plan as to how you are going to get home. Find an air ambulance service that will be able to transport you home safely if you are not well enough to fly on a normal aircraft.

Image Source

If you are going to be well enough to travel, but not in time for you pre-booked flight, your insurance should be able to cover the cost of booking a slightly later flight.

Research The Country

The best way to deal with illness abroad is to avoid it in the first place. Every year, thousands of people make themselves sick drinking the water in countries where they probably shouldn’t or damage their skin in the sun. A bit of research could have helped them to avoid this. Before you go somewhere, look into whether it’s safe to drink the water and whether you should get any kind of vaccinations. That way you won’t have to worry about getting sick in the first place.

Posts Related to this Article: