Needless to say, during this time the Korean Health Care System and I became much better acquainted. And this entry has sprung into existence in order to tell you about its Pros and Cons.
But first some history.
Around the fourth grade I got a cold. Up until this point, it was my mother’s philosophy that unless you were running a temperature of over 100 degrees or having a bone stick out of your body, you’d be just fine weathering it out at home with some cough syrup and/or sprite depending on your ailment.
It’s not surprising. My mother shares this philosophy with most Americans who, although they may have money and health insurance now, grew up poor and without the means to pay for doctors’ visits or prescription meds. They were the ones who busted their chins open and had them stitched back up with tiny butterfly band aids. They were the ones who broke their nose because they were bent, table-height, to watch the pool game and the pool ball jumped off the table and smashed them in the face. They were the ones who got a tooth pick stuck—not once, but twice—in their mouth and had to get their mother to reach into their throat and pull it out. All of which happened to my mother.
(My mother at Christmas)
But perhaps the early childhood story that illustrates my point the most is this one:
My mother and her older brother grew up running around outside and playing after school more or less on their own. Not because their parents were particularly neglectful, but because people were more trusting back then. And if you had to work late or on the weekend, or you had to clean the house, the kids were occupying themselves until you called them in for dinner. At least, that’s how it was for my mom. One weekend, my mom and her brother were home alone and mom got stung by a bee. She began to have an allergic reaction, swelling up and all that. She had never been allergic to bees before and neither of them knew what was going on, so Uncle Garry called my grandma at work. “Mom, I think Mary’s sick. She’s swelling up.”
To which Grandma replied, “Put her in the bathtub.” Case in point---her first reaction was not “take her to the hospital to see what’s wrong.”
Uncle Garry put her in the bathtub and mom continued to swell. It eventually got so bad that Uncle Garry called her back. “Mom, Mary says she feels like she’s gonna die.” Grandma finally relented and told Uncle Garry to get the neighbor to take her to the hospital whereupon the doctors saw her and immediately stuck her with an epi pen.
(Grandma and Uncle Garry around Christmastime)
All this to say that my mother does not go to see the doctor about ‘any old thing’ (like we say in the south). And, as a result, neither do I. So when I got a cold in the 4th grade, we prepared to ride it out. I took tissues to school, soccer practice, cheerleading practice. I blew my nose every chance I got. I tried to keep the snot from falling out of my nose every time I did a back handspring. That kind of thing.
The cold lasted through most of my fourth grade year. And when I came down with a fever one night that topped 100 degrees we went to the doctor. The family doctor, the one you have to schedule an appointment for and whose supposed to know your history and all that jazz. We get in, the doctor takes some x-rays of my head and declares that I have one of the worst sinus infections he’s ever seen. He prescribed me some heavy anti biotics and sent me on my way. Within a week or so I was feeling much better.
My mom, whose experience with allergies consisted of the aforementioned bee sting, felt like the worst mother in the world for not taking me into see the doctor sooner. She didn’t know my ‘cold’ was actually allergies that could not be ‘fought’ off like any ordinary virus or bacteria. It had taxed my sinuses for so long that they had become infected and made me really sick.
From then on I suffered one or two sinus infections every year until I finally got allergy tested in high school. Like my mom, I was hesitant of doctors and tests and all that. I avoided allergy testing and shots and instead relied on pills like claritan and zyrtec. When I finally got the shots they changed my life. I was no longer living in allergy hell.
Now I’m in Korea. I’m not getting allergy shots because I didn’t know how to deal with transferring prescriptions and, like I said earlier, I just don’t like to DEAL with all that medical stuff. I guess I still haven’t learned my lesson because now I’m suffering horribly.
(Me out at a bar on the weeknd. I was not up for partying)
I experienced the tell-tale signs of infection about three weeks ago. My co-teacher agreed to take me to the doctor. (She even said she thought she’d like to make an appointment because her throat was a little sore). I felt pretty proud of myself for going to the doctor. I was heading off the infection, taking initiative, not repeating my mistakes.
We went to an ear nose and throat doctor near my school. It was a small office and hardly anyone was waiting, although my co teacher was afraid there would be many people there. The doctor saw us right away. He looked up my nose and poked around a bit. I explained to him in English that I thought there was a sinus infection on its way. My co teacher didn’t really understand what that was, but I think she tried to explain to him the best she could.
After looking in my nose for a while he nodded and seemed to dismiss me. I moved to another chair where they had me put a weird red light thing on my nose for like a minute. My teacher got her throat looked at and, at the end, she leaned over a throat spray thingy and got stuff sprayed in her mouth for a minute. We paid about a dollar twenty each for our visits and trooped downstairs to the pharmacy. There we each paid about three dollars each for pills. I was supposed to take three different pills for three days. My co teacher got some stuff too (for what exactly, I’m not sure).
(Me after being sick for a while. You can see the sore on my nose from where I blew it so much.)
I took the pills. At the end of three days the infection moved into my lungs and I began coughing. This is where it got bad. I began to get feverish and extremely weak. I missed a day of school. I waited it out until my pills from the first doctor were done before I returned to the hospital. This time, I had to go to a big hospital because it was Sunday and all the small clinics were closed. This hospital was slammed with people.
I had to go up to a large counter and get a number, then sit and wait for my number to be called like at a Sears or JC Penny’s customer service desk. Then I went up to the desk to tell them my ailment, I guess they put my name in the computer on a list for a specialized doctor. I paid them a couple dollars and they sent me into another waiting room with a ton of people. I waited there for about twenty to thirty minutes. It was weird. We were all waiting in a central room with doors for different specialized doctors all around.
I went in to see the doctor, she listened to me breath through the stethoscope for a minute, listened to my self-diagnosis, and prescribed me some meds. The whole actual doctors’ visit took about five minutes. The whole process itself (I had to get another number in the bigger waiting room to check out) took about an hour. I went to the pharmacy and paid three dollars for a shit ton of pills. And when I say shit ton, I mean enough to take six different pills three times a day for ten days plus a bottle of cough syrup.
I took these and immediately felt my cough get better. AT the end of it I could tell the infection had moved out of my lungs, but now its back in my sinuses. I get sinus headaches everyday, I have to do a sinus rinse often. Its probably just Spring in Korea (it just now got warm enough for the blossoms to come out), but with all the antibiotics they were giving me, my body should not have been prone to infection that soon.
(Crash!)
From this experience, I will now tell you the pros and cons of the Korean medical system as I see it.
Pros:
1. Cheap Cheap Cheap!
My whole experience cost me under ten dollars. Perhaps a better example is Andrew, my boyfriend. He broke his wrist snowboarding. He had to go see two different doctors for preliminary examinations of his wrist, Plus had to get a cast on his wrist AND see the doctor twice for x-rays. The cast isn’t off yet, but the whole ordeal has cost him, as of now, under two hundred dollars. CRAZY.
2. Visits are fast
One of the first things Andrew said about seeing the doctor for his wrist was that it was amazingly fast and efficient. My own experience the first time I went to the ear nose and throat clinic was amazingly quick. I was in and out of the doctor’s office in thirty minutes. My co teacher and I even let school grounds to do it and were back before the school days was over.
Cons:
1. Quality may be sacrificed for Quickness
Although we were in and out quickly, neither Andrew nor I are feeling 100% better. In Andrew’s case, he happened to break a bone that takes a long time to heal. In my case, I think the meds they gave me were ineffective. Plus, I don’t believe they took time to examine thoroughly, especially when I went to the big hospital for my respiratory infection. This surprised me, because the language barrier prevented me from adequately explaining my situation. I thought, therefore, that they would take the extra time to examine me to prevent misdiagnosis.
2. Overperscription of meds
It has been my experience that doctors in Korea overperscribe meds like crazy. I think this is partly because they’re so cheap. Everyone can afford them so why not? But also, I think it has to do with the fact that Koreans feel better with a diagnosis and meds.
It has to do with the culture. I’ve noticed Koreans always like to prescribe a reason for things, even if the reason is not well thought out or based in fact. For example, Koreans like to say that the reason they didn’t get SARS when the other asian countries did was because of the healing powers of Kimchi. Also, whenever a kid is misbehaving in class, they like to say its because he/she probably has family problems at home even if that teacher knows nothing about that child’s family life.
I think it’s the same with medicine. They’re sick, they want to know why and theyw ant to be doing something about it. My co-teacher and her sore throat are a good example. She wasn’t really sick. She just went because it made her feel like she was doing something to get over her fatigue and sore throat (probably resulting from having to teach all day and yell at kids). My friend, Lisbeth, is another good example. She called in sick to school one day because she was tired and didn’t feel like going in. When she told her school, they said she had to have a doctor’s excuse. So she went to the doctor and made up some B.S. about “stomach problems” (of course there is still the language barrier and all that). The doctor diagnosed her with an infection of the large intestine and prescribed her meds!
Random List of the Day:
1.My co teacher just told me that we’re going on a faculty field trip at 1 o’clock. I wore a skirt and flats with holes in them to school today. I asked her when they found out about this field trip and she said “Yesterday, but we didn’t think we’d go because the forecast said it was going to rain. But it didn’t rain. So I guess we’re going.” To which I replied “I wish you had told me about the possibility yesterday so I could have brought extra shoes along.”
2.Its getting warmer in Seoul, but the temperatures are still pretty low. Like the low fifties and getting down into the forties at night. For a while, we felt like spring would never come (a week ago temperatures were still below freezing) The Koreans say this is the longest winter they’ve had in 100 years. Global Warming?
1 comment:
I'm glad you're recovering.
You write: "unless you were running a temperature of over 100 degrees or having a bone stick out of your body, you’d be just fine weathering it out at home with some cough syrup and/or sprite depending on your ailment."
In Upstate New York, where I grew up, it was saltines and ginger ale that were considered good for most ailments. I guess things are different, down South :-).
Post a Comment