Wait… do Germans actually travel to America to see a doctor?

Last time I went to a gastroenterologist here in the Dominican Republic, I overheard a Dominican woman talking about healthcare in Germany. She was complaining about how long it can take to get a doctor’s appointment there, saying that in some cases you can apparently wait up to a year if it’s not an emergency.

At the time I thought that sounded pretty crazy, but recently I came across another Reddit post where someone mentioned the same thing about long waiting times for medical appointments in Germany.

So now I’m wondering: how bad is it actually?

Do Germans ever travel abroad to get medical treatment simply because they can get an appointment or procedure done much faster somewhere else?

For example, would someone from Germany actually fly to the US, Canada, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Brazil, Colombia, or somewhere else in the Americas to see a specialist, get diagnostic tests, dental work, or even have a procedure done sooner?

Or is the whole “you have to wait forever to see a doctor in Germany” thing exaggerated?

If you’re German, what kind of waiting time would you consider normal for a specialist appointment when it’s not an emergency?

I’m genuinely curious because I’ve now heard the same thing from two completely different sources, and I’d like to know how much truth there is to it.