Those of you who think the US will be better off with Obama-Care, think again. I have seen what quasi-socialized medicine looks like and it SUCKS!! The teachers who are here from Canada, the UK, and Australia swear medical care is better here than there….scary thought! You get what you pay for.
We get 15 full days and 7 half days of sick time here. That sounds like a lot…NOT! You have to have a doctor’s note that also has to be stamped by the Health Ministry. So taking a “Mental Health Day” is not as relaxing as it should be. Unless you want to take an unpaid day, in which case you can skip jumping through the hoops.
My first experience with a Doctor began when I woke up one morning in October with my feet, hands, and eyelids swollen. This is not something that I am unfamiliar with. It means that I have an infection somewhere. It’s usually strep throat or sinusitis. No biggie. Give me some antibiotics and I’m on my way. Oh no, not this doctor. He sees the word Lupus on my records from the US and decides to bang my back! Well, duh, I jump; he decides I have Lupus Nephritis and orders an ultrasound. When the ultrasound comes back clean, he writes me a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and writes the diagnosis as “muscle spasm”. WTF? Whatever…I go to the pharmacy to fill the prescription for the NSAID even though I take an NSAID daily that is way stronger and he had a listing of my current meds. You can’t have too many meds around, right? The pharmacist pulls it out, puts it on the counter, and goes to do his paperwork thing. It has the word potassium on the label. WHOA! I can’t take this. Duh, little problem with an interaction with another med that I take. He substitutes another NSAID and mumbles about dumb doctors. The next day I decide to take an unpaid day and throw myself on the mercy of the pharmacist at Carrefour. Her words, “Doctors here no good! I know more. You know more! I fix you up!” I walked out with my antibiotic and the next day: all better!
Unfortunately I had to go back to Dr. Kevorkian when I woke up with a sinus infection and bronchitis in November. The bronchitis, no problem, he concurred. Sinus infection, NOT. Why? Because he banged on my face with a hammer and I didn’t jump. Seriously? What year is this? Either way, he was giving me my antibiotics so I didn’t care what he wrote on the stupid paper. But when I tried to get 120mg Sudafed from him…damn…you would have thought I was asking for Cocaine. “No, you cannot take, bad for heart.” I gave up and went on a search. You CANNOT get straight up Sudafed here, in any dosage. I found 30mg with 500mg of Tylenol…nope, take 4 of them and I’m begging for liver damage. I found 30 mg with 200 mg of Ibuprofen…..nope, asking for a hole in my stomach. The lesser of the 2 evils? I went for the hole in my stomach with a Nexium chaser. Carrefour Pharmacist lady concurred. Two weeks later when my upper teeth and ears were killing me because the sinusitis was not cleared? Off on a search for Prednisone. Yup, day two and I was feeling much better. I didn’t sleep for 2 days but…..sleep is overrated anyway!
One friend here went into anaphylaxis from something she ate. Another friend nailed her with an Epi-Pen and took her to the Emergency Room covered in head to toe hives. She was given a shot of Benadryl and a prescription for Allegra. Hives= Prednisone. Any first year nursing student knows this. My poor friend Melissa fell at Hard Rock Café. She was rocking just a little too hard! She was taken to the Emergency Room and diagnosed with a broken foot. She was given a shot of Ibuprofen and a prescription for Tylenol!!! Broken bone=Percocet/Vicodin. Even better, 3 days later, she was told the X-ray had been misread. It wasn’t broken after all. Since this wasn’t a doctor, she decided to go back again later. It WAS broken! I can’t make this crap up.
Top of the list of things Lauren brought for me: PEZ. Lots of Pez.
