About this guide

Purpose

What this guide is — and what it is not

This guide was created to help English-speaking families living in Tokyo navigate a healthcare system that can feel unfamiliar and difficult to access. It brings together clinic information, basic health guidance, translations, and emergency references in one place.

It is a starting point — not an endpoint. Use it to orient yourself, find a nearby clinic, or understand the basics of how the Japanese healthcare system works. For anything beyond that, speak to a doctor.

Origins

Who made this

This guide was created by students at the American School in Japan (ASIJ). It grew out of a recognition that English-speaking families living in Tokyo — including many within our own community — often struggle to navigate the Japanese healthcare system, not because the system is poor, but because the language barrier and lack of accessible, organized information makes it genuinely difficult to know where to go, what to do, or who to call.

The goal was simple: build something practical that we ourselves would want to use. Every section — the clinic finder, the translation tools, the urgency guide, the emergency reference — was built with that real, everyday problem in mind.

This is a student-built resource. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or representative of ASIJ as an institution, nor any medical organization, clinic, or government body.

Methodology

How this guide was built

The clinic information was compiled through research, community input, and publicly available sources. Translation content was drawn from established multilingual medical reference materials. The urgency decision tool and symptom guides are based on general health literacy frameworks — they are not clinically validated tools.

Clinic listings include the most recent available information about English-language availability, but this changes frequently. A clinic listed as English-friendly may have changed staff, hours, or services since this information was gathered. Always call ahead.

If you find an error, outdated information, or a clinic that should be added, use the "Submit a correction" button on the Clinic Finder page. We rely on community input to keep this accurate.

Contact

Get in touch

For corrections, suggestions, or questions about this guide, use the submission form on the Clinic Finder page. We review submissions regularly and update the guide accordingly.