@Barclayss
>that chibi OL avatar
Ah, a fellow man of culture!
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Well, actually, it's kind of a meme about US made by and for people outside it. In reality, most US citizens have a medical insurance, so they don't pay for services, or more like, they pay just per period for all potential cervices.
Again, I'm from a country with "free" medicine, so that's just as far as I know. In my country (Russia, lol), we have hospitals and
polyclinics, the letter being a place where you get counselled, and examined on a basic level. Usually it's one hospital with quite a few polyclinics around. Since I've basically never heard this term outside Russia (well, I guess it's common in eastern Europe), I assume US and Japan just use hospitals.