The Qatar Health Card (also called the Hamad Health Card) is your passport into Qatar’s public healthcare system. Without it, you’re paying full private rates at HMC facilities or going through the Emergency Department for everything, neither of which is a situation you want to be in long-term. Here’s the frustrating part that nobody tells…
Health insurance in Qatar is not optional. It’s a legal requirement, and since 2014 Qatar has been progressively tightening enforcement of mandatory health coverage for all residents. Yet despite it being compulsory, the system is confusing enough that I regularly meet expats who don’t fully understand what they actually have, what it covers, or whether…
If you’ve just arrived in Qatar and someone asks “which hospital should I go to?”, the honest answer is: it depends entirely on what’s wrong with you. Hamad General might be the right answer for a trauma emergency. It’s the wrong answer if you need a specific type of cancer surgery and don’t want to…
Healthcare in Qatar operates on a two-tier system that confuses most newcomers. You have your mandatory health card from Hamad Medical Corporation giving you access to public healthcare, and then there’s the entire private healthcare sector that most expats end up using despite paying for public coverage. Understanding which system to use, when to use…