I got back from Thailand last Thursday (over a week ago), and by Friday night I had come down with what appeared, at the time, to be a bad cold. Over the weekend, it became the most miserable of colds. Then Sunday evening around dusk, I came down with severe chills followed by burning fever. If I could only make it until Monday morning, I could make it to a pretty good clinic run by young, western-trained Singaporean doctors.
The thought of waiting another 15 hours to get relief was more than my sick body could bear though. So I did the unthinkable. I decided to go to a Chinese hospital.
I called some Chinese friends to see if they could go with me, but they were out-of-town or otherwise unable to assist.
My American friends across town probably would have taken an hour and a half to get here, and most of the ones in town right now don't know the local language. Knowing what I know now, I should have requested their help even without the language advantage.
Maybe it was because of the fever, but every muscle and bone in my body ached. If I had been much sicker, I couldn't have done this. I grabbed Mimi's dog blanket for warmth, and headed outside to find a taxi. I stood there, leaning up against a tree, for about 20 minutes before a taxi stopped for me. I told him to go to the K hospital, because they are supposed to speak English there. It's a 30-minute ride away. My driver immediately knew I was sick, and he was really nice to me.
He took me to the emergency room.
I stood in line to pay, the first of three times. This is where non-Chinese speakers could have helped me. I didn't feel like standing in line. I didn't feel like standing at all. They don't help you at the hospital until you pay though.
The nurse, standing at a counter that looked like a bank teller's counter, gave me a thermometer and told me to place it under my tongue. I told her it wasn't clean. She told me it had been disinfected. I told her, with my eyes, that I wasn't born yesterday. She smiled (because I was right) and told me I could put it in my armpit. No telling where that thing has been previously. Even at home I use disposable thermometer covers on my thermometer.
Then at the lab counter, they took my blood to test it. I asked the guy if he could please change out of his dirty rubber gloves and put on new ones for my sake before he drew blood. He cheerfully agreed. I don't think most people ask him to change.
Then with his new gloves on, he rummaged through files and instruments before he took my blood.
While he was working on this, a guy with bodily fluid resembling creamed corn, in a paper cup, came up and stood shoulder to shoulder with me. He and the lab technician used a little spoon to stir it, presumably in preparation to test it. It was inches away from me, and they had no concern for keeping the diseased fluid from spilling.
There were two "internal medicine" doctors in the same room with each other. Each had 3 people waiting to talk to them. They were all crowded around the doctor's desks while waiting. Privacy is not valued here.
The bathrooms were filthy, especially the floors, and there was no soap. No telling what diseases were in there. I disinfected my shoes with Lysol spray when I got home.
I got an IV that took over two hours. They don't let you lie down to get IV's. You have to sit in a chair in a room with dozens of other people who are getting IV'S. The girl who put the IV in me didn't use gloves. And I know from looking in the bathroom that if she bothered to wash her hands at all, she hadn't used soap.
I don't even know what was in the IV. I did get a Chinese friend to translate over the phone, but all I know was that it was to bring down my fever.
I also got an injection in my hip.
Did I mention that no one in the emergency room spoke English? I should have gone to another dirty hospital closer to where I live.
After two hours of the IV, I still had a fever. I got a taxi and returned home. During the night I broke into a sweat which I am told was my fever breaking.
But I was still sick.
The thought of waiting another 15 hours to get relief was more than my sick body could bear though. So I did the unthinkable. I decided to go to a Chinese hospital.
I called some Chinese friends to see if they could go with me, but they were out-of-town or otherwise unable to assist.
My American friends across town probably would have taken an hour and a half to get here, and most of the ones in town right now don't know the local language. Knowing what I know now, I should have requested their help even without the language advantage.
Maybe it was because of the fever, but every muscle and bone in my body ached. If I had been much sicker, I couldn't have done this. I grabbed Mimi's dog blanket for warmth, and headed outside to find a taxi. I stood there, leaning up against a tree, for about 20 minutes before a taxi stopped for me. I told him to go to the K hospital, because they are supposed to speak English there. It's a 30-minute ride away. My driver immediately knew I was sick, and he was really nice to me.
He took me to the emergency room.
I stood in line to pay, the first of three times. This is where non-Chinese speakers could have helped me. I didn't feel like standing in line. I didn't feel like standing at all. They don't help you at the hospital until you pay though.
The nurse, standing at a counter that looked like a bank teller's counter, gave me a thermometer and told me to place it under my tongue. I told her it wasn't clean. She told me it had been disinfected. I told her, with my eyes, that I wasn't born yesterday. She smiled (because I was right) and told me I could put it in my armpit. No telling where that thing has been previously. Even at home I use disposable thermometer covers on my thermometer.
Then at the lab counter, they took my blood to test it. I asked the guy if he could please change out of his dirty rubber gloves and put on new ones for my sake before he drew blood. He cheerfully agreed. I don't think most people ask him to change.
Then with his new gloves on, he rummaged through files and instruments before he took my blood.
While he was working on this, a guy with bodily fluid resembling creamed corn, in a paper cup, came up and stood shoulder to shoulder with me. He and the lab technician used a little spoon to stir it, presumably in preparation to test it. It was inches away from me, and they had no concern for keeping the diseased fluid from spilling.
There were two "internal medicine" doctors in the same room with each other. Each had 3 people waiting to talk to them. They were all crowded around the doctor's desks while waiting. Privacy is not valued here.
The bathrooms were filthy, especially the floors, and there was no soap. No telling what diseases were in there. I disinfected my shoes with Lysol spray when I got home.
I got an IV that took over two hours. They don't let you lie down to get IV's. You have to sit in a chair in a room with dozens of other people who are getting IV'S. The girl who put the IV in me didn't use gloves. And I know from looking in the bathroom that if she bothered to wash her hands at all, she hadn't used soap.
I don't even know what was in the IV. I did get a Chinese friend to translate over the phone, but all I know was that it was to bring down my fever.
I also got an injection in my hip.
Did I mention that no one in the emergency room spoke English? I should have gone to another dirty hospital closer to where I live.
After two hours of the IV, I still had a fever. I got a taxi and returned home. During the night I broke into a sweat which I am told was my fever breaking.
But I was still sick.
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