Health Coverage while in Japan

[Mulboyne]

I may have posted this already but I can't see where if I have.

Health Hokkaido.

http://www.healthhokkaido.com was established by a group of Japanese and Non-Japanese in order to militate some of the current gaps in health information and access in Hokkaido. We are all aware of the debilitating effect of disease and the reasons for seeking care early but for people from other societies going to hospital can be especially daunting in Japan. In an attempt to remedy these problems, we provide a range of web-based health services.

[ttjereth]

Ressurecting a dead thread, but I'm currently looking for health insurance because I'm tired of paying $4000 a year for kokumin kenko hoken and then still paying on top of that for each and every visit my wife or I make's to the doctor and significantly more for the few times she has been hospitalized in recent years.

I've gotten a quote from MedEx, but I'm still curious about a few things. Speaking to the guy on the phone it sounds like it's not worthwhile to claim the small visits (my wife goes to the doctor everytime she has a sniffle), but that it would be better to go with a lower end plan and insure ourselves (e.g. pay out right the full price for everything other than emergencies). Do any of the people on here using them have any advice on this? I can't really see things working out cheaper this way, since my wife consistently uses over a $1000 a year for just the 30% we pay under the national scheme, so adding in the 70% that the national scheme covers makes things close to to the $4000 we are paying anyway (and this is assuming just normal doctor's visits, in a bad year we could be looking at significantly more).

Also, it doesn't seem like vision (we both wear glasses and I use contacts) or dental is covered (except for emergencies on their higher end plans), but what are people who use their coverage doing for dental and vision?

I'm toying with the idea of keeping the national plan for my wife and getting private coverage for myself (I go to the doctor so rarely, it's almost bound to be cheaper for me to have insurance just for emergencies and pay the small stuff out of pocket), but I'm not sure if that's even possible/worthwhile (if they still bill the wife's national insurance based on my income, it's not going to change any).

How do people deal with the regular visits with other insurers listed in here? Does anybody even bother claiming for regular doctor visits?