3rd world hospitals
Selasa, 24 Juli 2007
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komentar
Urrrghhh - why was the human body designed to feel so much pain? 4am, lying on the toliet floor in my own vommit too weak to get up even to go to the toilet (yes, i pissed on the floor), sweating like mad, too nauseous to drink any water (it just came straight back up), i felt an all pervasive sense of wrongness.
Gathering my strength over then next hour with the assistance of 2 panadols, i manged to make it down the 2 flights of stairs to tell my hotel staff i needed a hospital. They took me too a local doctor by motorbike by which stage i was having some real trouble just holding on. Sitting in the waiting room chair felt not dissimilar to running a marathon. The (young and cute) doctor prescribed some anti-nausea medication which over then next few hours did little to help me get much water down, so i ended up going to a denpasar hospital expecting the worst. It turned out to be better than the hospitals i have visited in Australia - probably due to the fact most indonesians cant afford it ($1000 for my stay), thereby keeping patient numbers down. The treatment was first class - blood tests including tests for malaria, dengue fever, a drip, stronger anti-nausea medications, not to mention tv, aircon, spa-bath, cute nurses (not that i made use of any of these). I was even hooked up to a heart-rate monitor with 3 pads on my chest.
According to the doctors i was moderately dehydrated and ended up replacing about 1-1.5L. The fever went away after 24hrs and I have to go back every 12 hours for the malaria tests (6 total). All tests so far for malaria have been negative, indicating it might just be some infection. To me this episode seemed similar to my experience in Lombok - which could mean i have picked up something, but considering how i felt 24 hours ago i feel amazing right now, in an exhausted, but painless kind of way.
Gathering my strength over then next hour with the assistance of 2 panadols, i manged to make it down the 2 flights of stairs to tell my hotel staff i needed a hospital. They took me too a local doctor by motorbike by which stage i was having some real trouble just holding on. Sitting in the waiting room chair felt not dissimilar to running a marathon. The (young and cute) doctor prescribed some anti-nausea medication which over then next few hours did little to help me get much water down, so i ended up going to a denpasar hospital expecting the worst. It turned out to be better than the hospitals i have visited in Australia - probably due to the fact most indonesians cant afford it ($1000 for my stay), thereby keeping patient numbers down. The treatment was first class - blood tests including tests for malaria, dengue fever, a drip, stronger anti-nausea medications, not to mention tv, aircon, spa-bath, cute nurses (not that i made use of any of these). I was even hooked up to a heart-rate monitor with 3 pads on my chest.
According to the doctors i was moderately dehydrated and ended up replacing about 1-1.5L. The fever went away after 24hrs and I have to go back every 12 hours for the malaria tests (6 total). All tests so far for malaria have been negative, indicating it might just be some infection. To me this episode seemed similar to my experience in Lombok - which could mean i have picked up something, but considering how i felt 24 hours ago i feel amazing right now, in an exhausted, but painless kind of way.
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