Johnson: Back patient finds medical relief - in India

By Bill Johnson, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published January 28, 2006 at midnight

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I love telling stories about the health care industry in this country, of how it is often dysfunctional and inept, and, more than anything, how it is either unavailable or financially devastating for many of us.

To illustrate, allow me to tell the story of Nick Duren and D.J. Phillips.

It begins three years ago, the day they wheeled Nick Duren out of surgery on his spine at a well-known Denver hospital.

Discs up and down his spine had herniated and he could barely walk. Having retired well, he hired one of the top surgeons in the city to fix it.

The surgery didn't work. His right leg began to atrophy; he could barely climb a short run of stairs. The prominent doctor ran more and more tests. Nick Duren now could not swing a club, much less play his beloved golf.

He fired his surgeon. A veteran, Duren, 59, decided he would try the VA. Maybe doctors there could help him. He never got a call back. So he just lived with the pain.

Fast-forward to late last summer.

A buddy of Duren's had gotten him in touch with the top neurosurgeon in Omaha. He would fix everything for $150,000. The couple began exploring taking out a second mortgage on their Wheat Ridge home.

But then, days later, Duren and Phillips saw a segment on 60 Minutes about "medical tourism," of how Westerners are traveling to India and Thailand more frequently for surgeries they could never afford back home.

Phillips got on the computer. She wrote to the Apollo Hospital in New Delhi, India. She told the staff neurosurgeon, Dr. Harsh Bhargaza, about Duren's condition.

He wrote back immediately. He could "fix" him, Bhargaza promised in an e-mail. "You have what we call here 'failed back syndrome.' We see this a lot in my country," he wrote.

But he would need every medical record Nick Duren could get his hands on. They sent him a tall stack.

And, the doctor told them, he would need $10,000 wired to an account at the Apollo to make it happen. Duren and Phillips looked at each other, shrugged and sent the money.

The hospital sent the couple their itinerary the next day.

"We got to this very scary airport in New Delhi with a billion people outside, all of them yelling at us," D.J. Phillips recounted. "They told us our cabbie would meet us outside. Outside there were 2 million cabbies, all holding signs. Ours was at the tail end of the line.

"He's driving a 1940s Ambassador cab and goes screaming into the road, which has no lanes but is clogged with camels, donkeys, Brahma bulls, rickshaws, trucks and cars, all of which are competing for space. And we call I-25 tough. I thought we were going to die."

The Apollo turned out to be a foreboding, granite-and-marble holdover from British rule, where the nurses - "sisters," as they are called - still wear white starched uniforms and hats.

"What have we done?" Phillips asked Duren.

Doctors and technicians immediately descended upon them. For the next 10 hours, Duren would undergo a battery of tests.

Dr. Bhargaza told them he would operate the next day.

Nick Duren described the operating room as a dungeon, more like a World War II bunker than a shiny operating theater.

He remembered meeting with the five surgeons who would operate on him. He liked the number. "Let's go," he told them.

He was in surgery for nearly six hours. They removed screws and pins the Denver doctors had installed and put in something called an "Israeli cage," which apparently isn't approved in the U.S.

"It all seemed barbaric," D.J. Phillips said, "but the quality of care from the sisters and the doctors was unparalleled. They treated us like royalty."

The day after the surgery, a large earthquake struck New Delhi. Nick Duren, not wanting to be buried in the rubble of the hospital, actually walked down five flights of stairs. In the lobby, they found everyone praying.

He would stay 21 days in the Apollo Hospital. On Day 21, the couple met with Dr. Bhargaza to go over the bill. He refunded $1,500 to them. The surgery did not cost as much as he had figured.

With travel, hotel and other costs, the couple said the entire surgery cost less than $16,000.

"The meal charge for me, and I ate twice a day for 16 days, was $16," D.J. Phillips said.

In the days since they returned at the end of October, Nick's right leg has completely healed. He is, he said, pain-free for the first time in five years.

Three days after surgery, he and D.J. climbed the stairs into the Taj Mahal and took the tour on foot. He flew home without pain medication.

"We would have taken a second on the house," D.J. Phillips said, "but we finally decided to hell with the system, let's see what India has to offer."

Dr. Bhargaza still calls every week from India. The couple says he is now a lifelong friend.

"We could have destroyed our savings and gone to Omaha, with no guarantee of success," D.J. Phillips said. "But we took our chances. And as scary as it was, we would do it all over again.

"People need to know this."

Nick Duren now figures he will play his first round of golf in five years sometime next month.

Bill Johnson's column appears Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Call him at 303-892-2763 or e-mail him at johnsonw@RockyMountainNews.com.

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