One of the congregations in our community was hosting a Presbyterian Clergy on a sabbatical for a week.  He spent 3 hours with me at the hospital.  We had a rich lively conversation about the differences between hospitals in the Czech Republic and the United States.  In the Czech Republic they have a government controlled health system and everyone pays a mandated premium.  The large cities are the locations of the best hospitals.  Pre-qualification for treatments is required and high cost medical options are only available if you can pay the cost yourself.  As we talked about the needs of the people, we found much more in common.  Their patients have anxiety when they are sick, just like patients I encounter every day.  Their patients have worries about health care coverage, just like our patients do.  Their patients value pastoral care, just as our patients do.  But in the Czech Republic when it was under communist rule, clergy were not allowed in the hospitals to visit patients.  Trained chaplains are not nearly as common in their country as they are here in the USA.  Though we had never met before it was amazing how much we shared in common as we took a look at the issues people face when they are in need of health care.