Korealaista sairaanhoitoa

Ohessa Pekan kokemuksia korvatulehduksen hoidosta Koreassa.

Boy, did I have a day today,

My biggest acute health problem is my ears. Once or twice per year they get infected. Mostly it is the ear-corridor. This is what happened today.

So, I am in Seoul with the familiar pain in my left ear. I then walked down to the concierge and asked her to book a doctor for me. She showed me a brochure with beautiful pictures of clinics and proposed that I should call a certain number. I thought, not so bad and then I said: "No, you do it. I am so shy." After 15 minutes of consultation over the phone she decided to propose two clinics for me. The first one was near and the other one was even closer. So I said: "Let's take the closer one".

In Seoul Taxi drivers drop you off +-500 meters from where you were supposed to get to. This time, too. I recognized that the neighborhood was very different from the pictures of the clinics I was shown earlier. The taxi driver points me to a door. It is a normal condo. I can not get through the door, but 5 minutes later a boy comes down and I show him the same Korean note that I showed to the taxi. He said no, no, not here. Then he has a 5-minute call and points me in another direction. I walk as instructed and after asking three more confused Koreans I learn that the clinic is in a house in the second floor about 1/2 mile from where the taxi driver dropped me off. I scan through the bank offices, dental clinics, hairdressers and grocery stores on the second floor until I learn that it is in the third floor.

There are far less offices in the third floor and I find my clinic in no time. Of course nobody speaks English, but I still have my taxi note, so I show it to the female customers and receptionists in this room. Then someone points at an empty booth 2 * 2 meters. And another person says: "No today, come back tomorrow". Well, there is not much else to do that go back to square 1, the concierge.

This time I show with my face that I am not happy. Then I also enlightened her that she has wasted both my time and money. She calls the other clinic and makes sure that they are open. I jump into a taxi and this time he was far better, +-150 meters. I find the clinic easily and I also find it different from the first brochures shown, but the doctor is around 60 years and looked sympathetic, so I thought that he has seen a few bad ears. We talk about how nice Singapore is and how far away Finland is. I thought that Finland is not that far compared to Singapore, but for Koreans it is far away with the big Russia in between.

As I enter the clinic, the receptionist asks me: "Are you Mr. Pekka from Walkerhill". I said yes. She asks for my identification and fills in my form in 5 minutes. And in less than 10 minutes the doctor invites Mr. Pekka to his room. The furniture are quite nice, from the 1930's and his tools have a 1950-70's look over them.

After a 5 minute interview where both of us had as bad a vocabulary in medical English, the doctor inspects my ears, but his lamp was broken. He shook his tool and it started working and he could inspect my left infected ear. But when he tries to analyze the other ear it stops working, he shouts something to someone and in comes the receptionist and the nurse. My handy doctor has a flashlight as his spare-tool, but it does not work either. Some 10 minutes later the tool is repaired and he analyzes the ear. He says that my left ear is infected and it needs treatment. He said that the hotel asked him to take good care of me.

Next they clean my ear, not with "vacuum cleaners", but twisting topz dipped in spirits. After cleansing, he filled my ear with some bandage to "record what happens".

Then they ask me to bring all my stuff to the treatment room. He asks me to lie down on a bed sideways with my left ear upwards. I lie down and am quite interested in what happens next. They bring in a huge infra red lamp. Then they cover me in towels, except for the ear. They ask me if they can turn the massage on. I said yes, please do. It was quite nice actually, not massage, rather like someone drumming on my body. They turn on the lamp and disappear. I nearly suffocate under the towel so I open a breathing hole by my mouth. Sweat starts dropping from the impact of the warm room, hot lamp and the fact that I am covered by towels. I do not know how long I lay there, but I am guessing 20-30 minutes. The massage ended probably after 10 minutes. After that it was a nightmare to lie there.

The doctor then came back and told that he is going to give me antibiotics injections.
I asked "How many?"
He said "two".
I asked "Are you sure?"
He said "Yes, and then you need to take some more orally"
"OK. You are the doctor", I thought. But this has never happened to me before in my 50 ear infections I have had.
But one of the pills or injections may hit the spot.

So then the doctor asks me to pull clothes so that he can give them into the but. The first injection was Ok, but the second one was very painful. Then the nurse massaged my but and it felt like she did it with a knife. As I was lying there in pain the doctor asked me to get up. I said that I can not walk with the pain I have. He said not to worry, the worst pain will be over in less than half an hour. Then I got up, limped to the receptionist and paid 40,000 Won for the treatment, roughly 45 SGD. Or was it 30? I was quite dizzy.

Then the doctor walked with me to the pharmacy, gave the prescription to the lady and said some words that I could not understand. Sometimes I heard words like Walkerhill, Singapore and Finland. I just smiled with them. 10 minutes later the pharmacist had packed 12 small paper bags with 1 pink, 2 blue/white, 1/2 white and another white pill in each. That is probably more pills and injections that I have had in a year or two. The pharmacist looked at me and said that I could have a Vitamin C shot for free from the freezer. She probably thought that I looked too pale. The doctor had one too. So there I was toasting a cold and refreshing vitamin C-shot in a pharmacy with an old doctor instead of working in the bank as I should have. Then the doctor walked me to a taxi.

All this took me 5 hours. I do not want to question or point at anything. To me this was another interesting experience. And it is not over. Tomorrow morning at nine the clinic opens again. I need to be there so that he can remove the bandage and look how much secretion there is. Then I am either ready for work or some interesting adventures again.

Pekka

Korva saatiin lopulta hoidettua Singaporelaisen lääkärin avustuksella, joka ei ollut koskaan kuullutkaan Korealaisista menetelmistä.