Emergencies & Hospitalization
Tokyo Meguro Counseling Center
The phone number to call an ambulance in Japan is 119. For the police it is 110.
The Meguro Counseling Center recommends keeping a list of hospitals that are near your place of employment and residence that can provide you with medical and/or psychiatric care in the case of an emergency. If you think that you or a significant other may have an emergency and you are not accustomed to speaking Japanese easily, we recommend that you prepare a card in Roman letters that describes your name, address, phone number, and a few short phrases in Japanese that state your needs for emergency help. If you take psychiatric medications, you should also prepare a list of all your medication names and doses in Japanese. The Meguro Counseling Center can help you prepare this information.
Psychiatric or Medical Emergencies
If you or a significant other has a medical or psychiatric emergency and you cannot readily contact your therapist, you should either contact your medical physician or visit a hospital emergency room as soon as possible. Most all university hospitals have emergency rooms and psychiatric wards. One hospital with emergency services is the Tokyo Metropolitan Hiroo General Hospital (Tel: 03-3444-1181) in Minato ward located walking distance from the Hiroo subway station or a short Taxi ride from either the Ebisu or Meguro JR Yamanote line train stations. The British Embassy also has a helpful list of hospitals in Tokyo and Yokohama.
A private ambulance company, Zen Nichi Kyu (Tel: 0120-340-560), may be helpful in involuntary admission cases in Japan where the family has already made arrangements with a specific hospital. A large private psychiatric hospital is the Hasegawa Byoin in Chofu (Tel: 0422-31-8600). SOS International may be helpful for non-Japanese that require escorted repatriation to their home country.
Psychiatric Hospitalization
In the case that you or a significant other requires psychiatric hospitalization, your therapist can provide you with the names of some Japanese hospitals for your reference. However, as the therapists at the Meguro Counseling Center do not work directly with the physicians in these institutions, nor have any specific ability to effect hospital admission, they can not guarantee which hospital will actually accept a specific patient, the adequacy of the care provided, the ability of the staff to speak English, nor take responsibility for the care received from these medical facilities.
Obtaining admission to a psychiatric unit in Japan is usually not as easy to effect as it is in many Western countries. Japanese psychiatric hospitals and wards tend to be full, and these facilities usually require that the person has a significant and disabling psychiatric illness with active symptomatology. Fluency in Japanese, as well as participation in the Japanese National Health Insurance, are key factors in the likelihood of being accepted for psychiatric hospitalization. Without the National Health Insurance or good Japanese language skills, a Japanese hospital is likely to coordinate with one's embassy for prompt discharge and repatriation even if one is accepted for admission.
While your therapist will conscientiously help you with advice in these cases, the procedure for in-patient hospital admission is something that in the end is up to the patient and/or significant others to effect via contacting hospitals, taxi, police, ambulance, etc. You may also want to contact your embassy for advice and assistance. If there is ongoing risk of need for admission to a psychiatric ward and the person in question does not have good command of Japanese, then it is prudent to consider repatriation to one's home country before an emergency arises.
｜Home｜Japanese （日本語）｜Emergency Information｜Counseling Approach｜Psychodynamic Psychotherapy｜Cognitive Behavioral Psychotherapy (CBT)｜Group Psychotherapy｜Marriage & Family Counseling｜Child & Adolescent Therapy｜ADD/ADHD Treatment｜Core Issue-Defense Paradigm｜Depression Symptom Checklist｜Depression & Anxiety｜Psychiatric Medication｜Clinical Case Examples｜Tokyo Families Articles｜Mental Health Search/Links｜Mental-Health Books｜Corporate Services｜Therapist Profiles｜Practice Information｜Location & Therapy Hours｜Contact｜
Counseling Links
Contact Us
The Meguro Counseling Center consists of Western-trained therapists able to provide face-to-face mental-health care for the international community in Tokyo. With extensive experience in Japan, these therapists have a deep understanding of the stresses of living in Japan.