In an Emergency

People often ask me about medical care on Mackinac. We have a two-bed emergency room at the Medical Center which has staff on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Often it's all people need, but not always. (For example we had to deal with this, this, this,  this and this on the mainland.) Patients who need a higher level of care are regularly taken to the mainland on the ferry boat during the summer or on the airplane during the winter. Sometimes when a crisis happens, and an hour can mean the difference between life and death, patients are shipped to specialized care via an air ambulance service such as North Flight. When private services like that are unavailable (and it is life and death) the US Coast Guard will step in and airlift patients to care on the mainland. In January 2019 they brought the Katmai Bay to the Island when the weather made the helicopter impossible to use. 

A Coast Guard transfer is free, but the air ambulances are quite expensive. (And the Coast Guard will only come if all commercial options are unavailable.)  The husband of a friend of mine was flown to Petoskey by an air ambulance service after suffering a serious stroke. The bill? About $65,000; thankfully his health insurance covered 100% of the cost. Luckily, I have never needed one of these services and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I never will.