Health and Safety

1. If in Madrid, head for the Hospital de Madrid in Plaza Conde Valle Suchil (metro San Bernardo) and ask for Hospiquality, which has an office there. They explain how to obtain reimbursements from the student’s American medical insurer: they are mediators, not insurers or providers.

2. Whether in Madrid or not, Wesleyan students should refer to their pre-departure materials for information on travel assistance through International SOS/University Health Partners. Review your SOS materials to determine what kinds of medical care might need pre-authorization. Bear in mind program staff are not authorized to make these kinds of calls for you. You might well need to pay up-front and seek reimbursement from your American provider later. Check with SOS and your American insurance provider to determine what forms you need to claim reimbursements. SOS explains pre-authorization instructions and coverage and can provide some remote medical care directly. The SOS telephone number is (from Spain, dial 00 as if to the US, then the country code plus number as follows) +1 215 942 8478. As a rule, when you need any type of medical care except preventive medicine or maintenance medication (neither of which is covered), you will need to call this SOS number in Philadelphia. If you can arrange the appointments through International SOS (they need to authorize the care and then direct you to the appropriate hospital or clinic in Spain), you will not have to pay out of pocket. Whenever possible, contact International SOS as early as possible, even before you leave for Spain if you know you will need one or another kind of medical (including psychiatric) care while abroad. Students in the past have arranged regular mental health counseling and physical therapy in advance, to name just two possibilities. For more details about what is covered by SOS, see the following document: https://vwspain.files.wordpress.com/2022/01/wesleyan-international-travel-insurance-sob-2021-2022.pdf

3. Vassar students should follow the instructions for their equivalent to Wesleyan’s SOS, On Call International. Vassar students are enrolled in On Call Global Assistance, which provides some travel assistance as well as medical sickness and emergency evacuation benefits to supplement students’ other insurance coverage. It does not cover preventative care. The key to making the best use of your On Call benefits is to contact them in advance for any non-emergency situations. Call: +1 603-952-2665, text (00) +1 603-945-0103, or email: mail@oncallinternational.com. They will explain how to make any necessary appointments. They can also arrange for direct payment to be made for your medical costs when your expenses exceed $500. You can also submit a claim for reimbursement of all eligible expenses, including those under $500. View your ID Card and summary of benefits document linked as a pdf at the end of this subsection. You might also watch this video summary about the plan benefits.

The following outline summarizes how medical care works for students abroad:

     (a) For 24-hour emergency services (including late-night and weekend emergencies), especially after 8pm, you should go to a private hospital (see the Emergency and Other Useful Numbers link for recommendations in Madrid, particularly for late-night emergencies). The assistant director can help you locate a hospital or clinic near your homestay.

     (b) From Monday to Friday until 8pm, you can make an appointment usually on the same day for an in-person consultation with a doctor. Many doctors also offer on-line assistance from Monday through Friday from 8am to 9pm without interruption.

     (c) In the event of a serious accident, you should go to a public hospital. Tell your taxi or ambulance driver to take you to the nearest public hospital. Unlike the US, Spanish public hospitals are the go-to places for round-the-clock emergencies and major interventions.

     (d) Bear in mind that our local Spanish insurance, Adeslas, covers item b above. If you must go to an Emergency Room (Urgencias or UCI) at any time of day, Adeslas does not cover it and you will have to pay. For that reason, if you are not facing an emergency it is important to request a medical appointment (which you can usually get on the same day) to have your symptoms treated as outlined in items (a) and (b) above. These services are covered by Adeslas.

     (e) For anything not covered by Adeslas (for example, a fracture or broken bone, a sprained ankle, an accident that requires a hospital visit even if it´s just a burn or something in your eye that you can’t flush out, or if you have a cut that won´t heal and you need stitches, and certainly if you need some kind of surgery, any hospital will provide medical care. HOWEVER, if you want your American medical insurance to reimburse it or pay for it up-front you must request preauthorization by calling the international telephone numbers for On Call (Vassar) or SOS (Wesleyan). Bear in mind that no one else, not even the director and assistant director, is authorized to make that call for you. In that same call On Call or SOS will tell you which hospital or clinic to go to and how to proceed. They’ll open a file for you at that hospital or clinic and they’ll send the invoice to your insurance provider directly. If you do not seek the preauthorization and follow On Call’s or SOS’s instructions you will have to pay up-front and then follow your American insurance provider’s procedures to submit a claim for reimbursement.

Covid policy: as of January 2022, testing will be covered by the Vassar and Wesleyan insurance brokers (working with your American insurance providers) if it is considered medically necessary, that is if there are symptoms or there has been exposure. The Vassar international provider, On Call, works differently on this score from the Wesleyan provider, SOS International. For On Call, students must pay upfront and then seek reimbursement. Pepa, the assistant director, can help students find a local lab, clinic, or hospital for PCRs. For questions about and help with reimbursement claims, contact Kerry Stamp at Vassar. Wesleyan students should ring International SOS, those brokers will refer the student to a specific provider in Spain, the guarantee of payment (GOP) will be made, the student then receives the medical care and test and the provider sends the bill to the American insurance provider (for Wesleyan, Cigna). If the Wesleyan student goes to a clinic and pays out of pocket without preauthorization, the student can submit a claim but will have to indicate the test was taken owing to symptoms or exposure. Our American insurance brokers tell us that for exposure to Covid it is enough to report to the provider of the clinic that there was exposure to Covid or report it through the claims process. The CDC definition of exposure is: close contact with a person who has tested positive and who has symptoms in the period from 2 days before symptom onset until you have met the laboratory-confirmed criterion for discontinuing home isolation. This means contact within 6 feet for 15 minutes or more. Self-administered rapid tests are not covered. Only medically necessary tests (owing to symptoms or exposure) administered by a health care provider are covered. 

Although the Vassar and Wesleyan insurance brokers do not pay for Covid-related rapid tests (they DO however pay for PCRs under the conditions outlined above) and normally Vassar and Wesleyan, Adeslas, and the program would not pay for them, as a preventive (and democratic) measure the program will pay for rapid tests in the spring of 2022. 

Bear in mind, finally, that any medical expense in Spain that your American insurance provider does not reimburse or that you need to pay up-front for against reimbursement later will cost far less in Spain than in the US (indeed, by several orders of magnitude). The reason for this is that medical care in Spain (as we have seen specifically with respect to prices for and widespread availability of N95 masks, rapid tests, and PCRs) is far more regulated by the government in Spain than is the case in the US. Food for thought as you prepare to vote in future elections.

Student Medications

It is not a good idea to change medications or stop taking them before going abroad, as this is a relatively stressful event (even simple things, at least at first, will seem complicated). Students should bring all the medication they will need for the entire semester. Since our local insurance does not include a pharmaceutical plan, we cannot guarantee that students’ medications would be less costly abroad. Wesleyan’s study abroad health insurance does not cover prescriptions obtained in the US. Students must contact their American insurance company well before departure and request the necessary supply. Insurance companies must normally seek authorization from the student’s doctor and enter an “override” to provide the student upfront with the medications needed for such a long period. Students should bring medications in the original container, in case they need to purchase them in Spain. Finally, if the student’s insurer will only allow the student to bring a partial supply of medication for the semester, the program recommends the student bring a clearly written prescription for the balance to be filled in Spain (but reimbursed by the student’s American insurer). This is preferable to having medications mailed from the U.S. by post, because they can be held up for a week or more at Customs and retrieval can sometimes be difficult (even impossible) and costly.