Being diagnosed abroad mainly shortens the weeks or months that sit between appointments. The gaps are wide. More than 10% of patients surveyed in the United Kingdom and in Canada had waited more than 1 year to see a specialist, and in Europe a hip replacement meant 343 days in Poland and 667 days in Slovenia in 2024. In the United States, the average wait for a medical appointment across 15 major metropolitan areas reached 31 days in 2025, up 48% since 2004. For that time saving to be worth anything, the file has to be prepared before departure, the tests grouped together, and you have to come home with a report the doctor who takes over can actually use.
If you are coming to Brussels to get a health concern clarified quickly, Noria Health Hub can arrange a full check-up or a second medical opinion in Brussels, with a report within 24 h, coordinate your care where needed across more than 40 medical pathways in 48 h, then, if your medical condition allows, arrange surgery within 7 days.
The waits patients face in their own country
| Region / country | What is measured | The result |
|---|---|---|
| Europe / OECD | Specialist appointment | 52% wait at least 1 month |
| United Kingdom | Specialist appointment | More than 10% wait more than 1 year |
| Canada | From family doctor to treatment | 30 weeks median, 57.5 weeks in orthopaedics |
| United States | Medical appointment, major metropolitan areas | 31 days on average, up 48% since 2004 |
| Europe, hip | Median wait before a hip replacement | 209 days Hungary, 343 days Poland, 667 days Slovenia |
| Australia | Elective surgery | 6% over 1 year, septoplasty 320 days median |
| Singapore | First public specialist appointment | 35 days median subsidised, 12 days non-subsidised |
The most telling figures do not come from a single country. In 2023, more than 10% of patients surveyed in the United Kingdom and in Canada reported having waited more than 1 year to see a specialist. In Europe, in 2024, the median wait for a hip replacement reached 209 days in Hungary, 343 days in Poland and 667 days in Slovenia. In the United States, the average wait for a medical appointment across 15 major metropolitan areas reached 31 days in 2025, up 48% since 2004. In Australia, 6% of patients admitted for elective surgery in 2024-2025 had waited more than 1 year, and for an ENT septoplasty the median reached 320 days. Singapore, by contrast, recorded a median of 35 days in 2024 for a first subsidised public specialist appointment, so not every country faces the same waiting problem.
What travelling for care can genuinely speed up
Travelling for care acts above all on three points of organisation.
| What changes | Why |
|---|---|
| Concentration in time | It is not the examination room that moves faster, it is that every appointment is booked in advance, over one or two days, in one place. The delay you face at home is an access delay, not an execution delay |
| One team reading everything together | An assessment scattered over months produces tests nobody reads together. A multidisciplinary synthesis done in one go is not the sum of the individual reports |
| The report in hand before you leave | The second delay, the one for results, is the one people forget to count. It is often longer than the appointment delay |
The three problems travelling does not solve
This is the part nobody writes, and it is the part that decides whether the exercise is worth anything.
| What stays open | What it means in practice |
|---|---|
| Continuity of care | The diagnosis is made elsewhere, the follow-up will happen at home. A report that does not reach your own doctor, in a language they read, with usable images, is a lost report. That is the first risk of this approach, ahead of any medical risk |
| Availability of treatment | A recommended treatment is not necessarily available, reimbursed or authorised in your country. That is checked before, not after |
| Anything that is an emergency | No scheduled work-up replaces an emergency. Travel is prepared, it is not improvised in the face of a sudden symptom |
What the literature cannot tell us
The limit of the published work is clear. There is no randomised trial and no international registry comparing the health outcomes of patients who travel for a diagnosis with those of patients who wait at home. The publications available deal mainly with satisfaction and with economic flows, not with clinical outcomes.
So we cannot tell you that travelling improves your prognosis, and we will not. What we can document are the waits you face where you live, and what the literature measures about the consequences of those waits, cancer by cancer and specialty by specialty. That is the subject of the other articles on this blog.
What it takes for travelling for care to be genuinely useful
| The point | What we do |
|---|---|
| Everything is decided before arrival | Intake form and pre-assessment, risk stratification, review of your previous imaging, and an individually signed justification of every irradiating examination. By the time you arrive there is nothing left to decide |
| The report is written for your doctor | Not only for you. That is what turns a diagnosis made elsewhere into care at home |
| Follow-up is planned and dated | Day 14, day 30 and day 90 after your visit. A diagnosis without organised follow-up produces the drawbacks of travel without its benefits |
| We say no when it is no | If your situation calls for a test the chosen format does not contain, we will tell you so rather than sell you this one |
In practice, if this concerns you
You set out your problem, your symptoms or your question. Reports, test results and images you already have can be reviewed before you arrive, so that the pathway is ready. The aim is not to run every examination as a matter of course, but to select those that can genuinely confirm a hypothesis, rule out a risk or guide a decision. The results are then brought together in one synthesis, the next steps are organised, and the follow-up is coordinated afterwards.
Arrange my pathway in Brussels
Need a medical opinion quickly? For a worry that is not a matter for the emergency services, you can ask to speak to a doctor at any time through Noria Health Hub. This on-demand medical consultation is billed separately from the assessment pathway.
Further reading
The companion articles.
Waiting” rel=”noopener” target=”_blank”>https://noriahealth.com/blog/what-delay-really-costs-what-the-studies-say/”>Waiting for a diagnosis or a treatment, what the studies actually measure
How” rel=”noopener” target=”_blank”>https://noriahealth.com/blog/how-we-build-a-health-assessment/”>How we build a health assessment
Sources
Commonwealth Fund, International Health Policy Survey, 2023. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/surveys/2023/nov/2023-international-health-policy-survey
NHS England, Referral to Treatment Waiting Times, Statistical Press Notice, March 2026. https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/rtt-waiting-times/
Fraser Institute, Waiting Your Turn, Wait Times for Health Care in Canada, 2025. https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/waiting-your-turn-wait-times-for-health-care-in-canada-2025
AMN Healthcare, Survey of Physician Appointment Wait Times, 2025.
Direction de la recherche, des études, de l’évaluation et des statistiques, Études et Résultats, 2018, données 2016-2017. https://drees.solidarites-sante.gouv.fr/sites/default/files/2020-08/er1085-2.pdf
Directive 2013/59/Euratom, article 55, justification individuelle des expositions médicales.
NHS England, National Disease Registration Service, Routes to Diagnosis. https://digital.nhs.uk/ndrs/our-work/ncras-work-programme/routes-to-diagnosis