I just had the misfortune of having to get surgery but I had the tremendous good fortune of getting it done by a really competent surgeon and was well looked after at the hospital by professional and kind staff who did their best to communicate with me despite my rather basic Japanese. (I am a late-career entrant to Japan and have been learning the language in my spare time for only four years.) I’m also impressed by how practical and flexible they were despite all the general experience of formality and rigidity in Japan. My surgery was on Friday and I was scheduled to stay at the hospital for five days. But when I asked the doctor if it’d be okay if I went back home on Sunday if everything looked all right, he was extremely accommodative. Not only that, because there were no clerical staff to look after billing and payment on a Sunday, they actually let me go without paying anything. I’m supposed to square everything off when I go for my follow-up appointment next week. I feel super thankful for all of this and I have a question for anyone that has been through surgery in Japan: Is it a practice to give some kind of thank-you gift to the attending surgeon or do you just express your heartfelt thanks many times over? I don’t want to inadvertently insult anyone. But if there’s any way I can show my gratitude to the doctor who fixed what Nature broke, I would love to know. Thank you.
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After I delivered my son via c-section, I got thank you cards for the maternity wing, the NICU wing, and for the IVF wing, and the psychiatry wing of the hospital.
I wrote a thank you note to each of the different wings and included a picture of my infant son.
When I had my follow up appointments, I handed them out. Everyone was so surprised that I did this, but were very happy.
TLDR – you can absolutely thank your surgeon. I think simple card with a personal note should be fine.
Edited for a few words.
You absolutely can 😊 As medicine is a heavily regulated industry, you can’t give hospital staff anything super expensive, but they will very much appreciate a box of sweets or snacks that everyone can share, along with a simple thank you note.
Something they can put in the staffroom to share should be ok.
It depends on the hospital what we are allowed to accept, but an inexpensive wrapped department store omiyagi is okay. Like cookies or castella or something!
I had surgery last year and they took great care of me and let me go early (I was climbing the walls at 8 days).
My wife got the nurses some sweets and my surgeon and I have stayed in touch via email, which was good because I had a related issue last month (!) This second surgery I paid a week after checking out.
Great to hear this kind of experience in this sub .
Don’t forget to give thanks to the anesthesiologist too!
He/she was the one ensuring you’d wake up alive after the surgery after all…
True story.
I’ve been in hospitals that have signs posted that say under no circumstance to give the doctor or staff gifts.
You might want to double check before you go to all the trouble.
The hospital may have something on its homepage.
I am working in a hospital. In my opinion, writing letter to the doctor is one of good way to express gratitude. Because, it always makes me really happy.
Buy a big box of cakes/cookies/snacks from a department store. They have a section for this. You’ll probably have to offer it a few times before it will be accepted but they’ll be grateful and enjoy the snacks.
Based on my knowledge from Doctor X, you can thank them with manju that has stacks of 10,000 yen notes underneath.
Wow, they let you out? You must be very persuasive! I had an emergency ten-day stay in February and they absolutely would not budge, no matter how much I begged and pleaded to be released. I guess it’s the luck of the draw.
I’m glad you’re on the mend. Stay well!