Nomad Capitalist Chapter 7: Nomad Healthcare - Go Get a Big Mac (Seriously)

“Go eat at McDonald’s. Get a Big Mac.”

That was actual medical advice. From an actual doctor. In an actual hospital.

Henderson was sitting in Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok after losing almost thirty pounds during three months of traveling through Southeast Asia. He walked into the hospital at 10:00 am. By 10:05 am, two nurses who spoke near-perfect English had him sorted with a cup of tea and a plan for a full battery of diagnostic tests. Within a few hours, everything was done. Ten minutes of waiting for results. Then the doctor told him he was perfectly healthy. The weight loss was just from eating different food and walking ten miles a day in tropical heat.

The prescription? Go eat a Big Mac.

That is the kind of chapter this is. Henderson takes everything you think you know about healthcare and flips it upside down.

The Western Healthcare Problem

Here is what Henderson observed in his travels. In the US, you go to a doctor for a scratched eyeball and they warn you about possible blindness. You have a hangnail and they bring up cases of people who died from acute paronychium osis. Everything is worst-case scenario. Meanwhile, medical error is the third highest cause of death in the United States. People are literally dying from the care itself.

And it costs a fortune. Henderson paid over $500 for that scratched cornea visit. At Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok, he got a full diagnostic workup with multiple lab tests, minimal wait times, and a relaxed doctor who joked around with him. The whole experience was efficient, professional, and affordable.

I have lived through socialized medicine in the former USSR and I have dealt with western healthcare systems. Neither is great. In one you wait forever and hope the equipment works. In the other you pay a small fortune and hope they do not accidentally kill you. Henderson is saying there is a third option. And it is in places most westerners would never think to look.

The $123 Emergency Room Visit

Two months after Bangkok, Henderson got tonsillitis in Kuala Lumpur. Being from the West, he toughed it out for two days before his hotel told him to just go to the emergency room.

“The emergency room?! Do you think I’m dying?!” he panicked.

Turns out, in Malaysia, the emergency room is not the terrifying financial catastrophe it is in the US. He went to Prince Court Medical Center. Within moments they checked his vitals. The nurse put together a treatment plan. He got IV medications, saw a doctor, and was out the door feeling great in under two hours.

Here is the bill, broken down in US dollars:

• Hospital administration: $1.56
• Nursing fee for an hour of care: $4.67
• Consumables (IV, bandages): $21.24
• Pharmacy: $82.01
• Doctor visit: $10.90
• Total: $123

One hundred and twenty-three dollars. For an emergency room visit at what was ranked the number one medical tourism hospital on the planet. The doctor had studied in London. He spoke excellent English. He did not rush Henderson out of his office.

Henderson points out that for $123, you could not even get the receptionist to stop filing her nails at a US hospital. He has a point.

This made me think about my own experiences. I remember paying equivalent amounts for basic checkups in Eastern Europe that would cost five to ten times more in western countries. And the quality? Often the same or better. The doctor who studied in London is the same doctor whether he works in London or Kuala Lumpur. Except in Kuala Lumpur he has more time for you because the system is not drowning in paperwork and insurance battles.

Medical Tourism Is Not Crazy

Henderson makes a strong case that the idea of the US or Europe being the only places for quality healthcare is outdated and possibly dangerous.

Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok has been accredited by the American Joint Commission International multiple times. Its medical chief is an accredited physician in the UK. Many of its doctors studied overseas. This is not some back-alley clinic. It was specifically built to attract international patients.

Prince Court in Kuala Lumpur has one of the world’s most advanced burn units and IVF facilities. India’s Asian Heart Institute in Mumbai has the lowest heart surgery mortality rate at 0.26%. Singapore is known for excellent cancer care. A US grocery chain actually had a policy of flying employees to Singapore for expensive surgeries because even with round-trip flights for two people and hotels, it was cheaper than doing the surgery at home.

When an independent group ranked the world’s top ten hospitals for medical tourism, the list included Malaysia, Germany, Lebanon, India, South Korea, Thailand, Turkey, and Singapore. How many of those countries would you trust with your health before reading this? Probably not many. But the data says they are world-class.

Henderson even found great dental care in Bucharest, Romania. A full checkup and cleaning with advanced imaging of all his teeth cost about $25. Serbia is also known for affordable quality dentistry.

Wellness Tourism: Go to the Source

Henderson takes this further. It is not just about fixing problems when they happen. It is about going where healthy living is the default.

Japan has the world’s longest healthy life expectancy. Low cancer rates. A culture built around clean eating, green spaces, and things like forest therapy, where people take recuperative walks in temperate rainforests. Before spending time in Japan, Henderson never would have eaten seaweed. Now he considers it an excellent protein source.

He also picked up tea culture from living in Asia. Turns out black tea, the western favorite, is the most fermented, most caffeinated, and probably worst for you. White tea is apparently where it is at. Minimal fermentation, low caffeine, plenty of disease-fighting properties. Henderson doubts he would have discovered any of this sitting in Arizona.

Georgia has sulfur baths that even Vogue wrote about. Iceland has hot springs. Thailand has real Thai massage. Turkey has hammams. Switzerland has alpine wellness clinics. The point is, you can go directly to the source instead of paying for some overpriced London spa that claims to import mystical ingredients from Namibia.

This resonates with me. I have seen the difference food quality makes when traveling. Henderson mentions how the US fell to 21st place on Oxfam’s “Good Enough to Eat” food quality index. High diabetes, high obesity. Meanwhile, countries like Ukraine, Albania, Ecuador, and Estonia scored as well as some Western European nations for food quality. The produce is organic because factory farming has not taken over yet. The vegetables taste like vegetables. The meat is locally sourced.

Henderson even suggests a business idea: bring the healthy food delivery concept to Eastern Europe and Latin America. The quality ingredients are there. The quick-serve infrastructure is not. Someone should do this.

You Do Not Need Insurance for a $123 Bill

One practical point Henderson makes that I think is worth highlighting. If you are living in countries with affordable healthcare, traditional health insurance becomes less necessary for routine care. When an ER visit costs $123, filing insurance paperwork is not worth your time.

Insurance still matters for catastrophic events. If you get hit by a bus, yes, you want coverage. But for the everyday stuff, checkups, minor illnesses, dental work, the costs in many countries are so low that paying out of pocket is simpler and cheaper than maintaining expensive insurance plans.

This is a mindset shift. Most westerners think healthcare without insurance means one illness away from bankruptcy. In Bangkok or Kuala Lumpur, it means reaching for your credit card to pay a bill that is less than your monthly streaming subscriptions combined.

Key Takeaway

Healthcare is not a reason to stay in your home country. It might actually be a reason to leave.

The best hospitals in the world are not necessarily in New York or London. They are in Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Mumbai, and Seoul. The costs are a fraction of western prices. The quality is the same or better. The doctors studied at the same institutions. And they have more time for you because the system is not broken.

Henderson’s approach is the same here as everywhere else in the book. Go where you are treated best. Literally. If you need a heart surgeon, India has cardiologists who cost 90% less than US ones. If you need dental work, Romania and Serbia have you covered for pocket change. If you want to stay healthy long-term, live in places where people eat real food, walk instead of drive, and drink white tea instead of energy drinks.

The Big Mac prescription was a joke. But the underlying message is serious. Healthcare around the world is better, cheaper, and more accessible than most people think. You just have to be willing to look beyond your borders.

Book: Nomad Capitalist by Andrew Henderson | ISBN: 9798461831486

Previous: Chapter 6 - Love and Family on the Road Next: Chapter 8 - Offshore Banking

Part of the Nomad Capitalist series