Pretty crappy healthcare

Life Health & Fitness
1

Sorry for the rant, but I’m really pissed off: :fume:

Three weeks ago, my daughter was ill, with high fever. The pediatrician (which is usually competent with common colds) diagnosed an infection in the ear, and prescribed some antibiotics and many different medicines, but only for three days (in my experience, when a doctor prescribed antibiotics to me, he said that at least I had to keep taking them for a period of 7 to 10 days, to make sure we killed all the bacteria… If we didn’t, the bacteria would reproduce and make a comeback, and more resilient to that particular antibiotic). The ear infection got better, but my daughter still had high fever (~39C), so the pediatrician took off the antibiotics and changed the acetaminophen by ibuprofen. She seemed to get better, and we started taking her back to daycare.

After one week doing the normal routine, she got high fever again, almost reaching 40C, and the doctor prescribed the same that worked last time. After two days in which the medication was useless (save for the ibuprofen, that lowered the fever for a while until it returned), the pediatrician changed the medication with identical results.

Today, seeing that she still had fever, took her to the doctor again, and she sent us to the Adventist Hospital in BaDe Rd. There. They did an X-ray, a mouth swab and they checked her ears. Diagnose: rampant pneumonia (the left lung was almost full of mucus, and the fourth of the right one was also full), to make things worse, it seems that the ear infection went deeper and now she has acute middle ear infection (no wonder she kept crying randomly even if she didn’t had fever). She’ll have to stay at least three to five days in the hospital until she gets better.

And the thing that enrages me most: they tell us she has pneumonia, and clogged airways, and the ear infection. Next thing they say is “but we don’t know why. If you want us to find out, you’ll have to pay for all of this additional tests”. Really? That’s a joke of a public healthcare! :fume:

When we were back in Barcelona for christmas, she caught a cold, and when we went to the hospital, they did a full check, complete with x-ray, blood tests and snot cultures to be sure they used the best medicines to kill whatever infection she had. Cost for me: none at all, because she’s my daughter and I pay every month to social security to cover for me and all my family. And this is after Spain has been drastically reducing the public healthcare budget (less than 50% of what it used to be), but still works better than the healthcare in Taiwan. :raspberry:

Well… That was it. I hope she can get better soon… She is really uncomfortable with the IV attached to her arm.

2

Sorry to hear that. Yesterday I was talking to a friend, and I remarked how much doctors in general tend to avoid extra work. They give you a bunch of pills and then wait until you heal up.

3

They don’t even give you a bunch of pills, they count them and give you just the amount for three days. Any doctor in Europe would probably agree that antibiotics have to be taken for enough time to obliterate the source of infection, or the bacteria becomes resilient and makes a comeback… With a vengeance.

Taiwan logic… :loco:

4

I know this is off topic. But your daughter is cute. :slight_smile:

Anyway, from my experience, there’s some legal reason why they only prescribe only 3 days worth of medicine. When your medicine runs out, you’re suppose to go back for a follow-up if you’re still not well. And then you get more medicine. Very rarely will doctors prescribe more than 3 days worth. I don’t know the rule for this, but they follow some SOP. I hope your daughter gets well soon.

5

I usually get more than 3 days pills.

6

It’s not usual to get more than three days of drugs prescribed. It’s not a bad idea for the patent, as the doctor is supposed to monitor the treatment, and it reduces waste. It also costs people more , but cest la vie,

Luckily they figured it out now, hope she gets better soon!

7

Sorry about your plight. Always tough for a daddy to see his baby get so sick, and the incompetence you have encountered would be frustrating for me too.
Medical clinics in Taiwan are largely high volume businesses. In and out, as many as possible, as quickly as possible. For minor issues, that’s fine, but for persistent problems, I’d go directly to a hospital specialist.

My understanding is that NHI will only allow doctors to prescribe three days of meds. Our docs usually tell us to come back in three days if someone is on antibiotics.

I’m glad you’re at a hospital. For the future, you might want to take your girl directly to Simon Chan. He is USA educated and in my experience, an expert diagnostician. He is easily located through the search function or Facebook (I’d help you with that but I’m in a note in China, the land of no Facebook, and where hotel wifi is very sluggish). Good luck and best wishes for a speedy recovery for your darling little girl.

Tomas

8

Hope your girl feels better soon :slight_smile:

The whole idea of giving a few days antibiotics is, I assume, so that the doctor gets another follow up visit and another billing to NHI.

Ive been to dermatologists who give me antibotics for acne, a 7 day supply. A lot of people get busy and forget to follow up, which will make it easy to create drug resistant bacteria.

On another note, I had pneumonia last year, and they gave me every test possible to get to the bottom of it. Sounds like you just got a crappy hospital perhaps.

I’m happy she only has to stay for 5 days. I had to stay for two and a half weeks due to complications. Even now if they do an lung xray, there still is a shadow remaining from the pneumonia, not sure if that is permanent damage or not.

9

I agree. I’ve met one or two extremely competent and smart doctors running small clinics, but in my experience 90% of ENTs simply diagnose everything as a cold (probably because it usually is - it must be a soul-destroying job dealing with bored pensioners with colds). I suspect there are still a few older doctors running back-alley clinics who don’t have a real medical degree, perhaps obtained via grease or a degree mill back in the day.

Anything that doesn’t look like an actual cold: go to the hospital. At least no lasting damage done - it could have been a whole lot worse. Hope little’un gets better soon!

I don’t get the 3-day antibiotics course either. As mentioned, it’s theoretically to ensure the doctor gets to check on progress (and another payment) but in practice I bet that doesn’t happen a lot of the time.

10

This is how we operate. Since our boys are prematurely born so we get very nervous when whatever they have lasts more a couple of days without improving. We’d then take them to a research hospital that we have good experiences with. It’s costly because of the distance and it charges more than clinics. We also disinfect our hands very frequently so they don’t get sick as often, to save money and to save them from taking medicines. Daycare is a hub where kids pass around their bugs. We are not sending them to one, at least not now.

11

[quote=“finley”]
I don’t get the 3-day antibiotics course either. As mentioned, it’s theoretically to ensure the doctor gets to check on progress (
and another payment
) but in practice I bet that doesn’t happen a lot of the time.[/quote]
I’ve heard that this is the main reason :wink:

Really shitty how they handle antibiotics here. I once got a round of antibiotics (which I didn’t take) for a common cold. (yeah usually I wouldn’t go in for a cold but I was new in Taiwan and my work said I needed a note to miss a day)

12

Totally off topic, but how old is she?

If over 6 months you’ll want to discontinue the pacifier since it is associated with increased ear infections. Under 6 months keep it but only at night since it reduces the likely hood of SIDS. For future reference don’t start paci use until an infant has established an appropriate latch on the nipple and feeding is progressing typically.

13

She’s a little better right now. My main complaint, aside from the evident misdiagnose, is that the hospital will just say “yeah, pneumonia. You want to know more? Pay us for the tests.” If you don’t or can’t pay, how do they medicate her? With m&m’s? for a public healthcare, this is third world-ish.

As for the pacifier, we just use it when she has to sleep. Sometimes she just spits it out whe she’s sleeping, so she’s detaching from it.

We know the ideal thing would be to avoid daycare, but she’s at an age (15 months) when she needs almost constant stimulation. I work at home and I’ve been taking care of her as long as I was able to, but I can’t have her squealing and howling for attention when I’m in the middle of a business call, and happens every single time. She also needs interaction with other kids, and get used to ther people besides me, her mom and grandparents. She really loves going there, and every morning she just gets her shoes and goes to wait at the door. She gets really excited about going there and play with her friends.

Ailments are just the downside, and if they had cured her properly in the first place, instead of the “no fever, she’s OK” chabuduo approach, she wouldn’t have had this problem.

14

Aren’t kids supposed to catch bugs when they are young, to build up their immune systems? I’m sure I’ve read articles which argue its a good thing, and that over-sanitising may have negative effects. Quick google reveals:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis

15

It’s great that she’s detaching from it. Good luck with whatever you choose, just keep in mind that paci use can impact speech development as well as dentition development, along with raising the likelihood of ear infections (which carries with it a variety of problems, from scar tissue on the tympanic membrane due to multiple perforations to speech delay due to the inherent high frequency hearing loss symptomatic of middle ear fluid retention associated with otitis media).

16

First i hope your kid gets better

Re the antibiotics, they are hugely over prescribed in the West, hugely, hence the advent of superbugs.

Having an x ray because she had a cold when you were in Spain may seem good to you, but to someone who worked in radiology for 20 years its bad practise.

No healthcare system is perfect but parents are also notoriously the most critical of services, the most likely to become violent towards staff too. Misdiagnosis happen all around the world, even in Spain . The number of post holiday makers who have come in with neck pain despite being x rayed in Spain and have a broken neck, in my sole experience is a yearly event, as in i saw it every year. Thats not a dig at Spain or you, patients do get misdiagnosed, it happens. Its down to numbers.

My experience of healthcare in taiwan is that it has been first class. No complaints.

17

That’s what I thought, but I suppose it’s a fine line. You want them to come into contact with dirt and bugs that aren’t going to be fatal. Some childhood illnesses are pretty horrible and parents naturally want their kids not to experience them. But I really don’t like the modern obsession with sanitizing everything, and I doubt it even works. A kid can still catch mumps or chickenpox just by being around a crowd of other filthy brats, even if every available surface and pair of hands has been doused in sanitiser. Skoster?

18

I’m so sorry to hear about this, but I’m glad she’s finally getting the proper treatment.

I had an experience similar to dan2006 back in 2009: I had persistent high fever and went to the ER, where I was diagnosed with pneumonia and had to stay in the hospital for 7 days. However, at the ER I told the doctor that I’d been hospitalized with pneumonia eight years previously in the US, so that’s probably why they checked for it.

Maybe in your daughter’s case they didn’t because of her age. I’m not a doctor, but I still feel they should have checked for pneumonia considering her symptoms and persistent fever.

19

The thing is, we vaccinated her against pneumonia, but they say this is a different strain. But in the X-rays, you could see one lung almost completely flooded with mucus. :frowning:

20

People keep telling me health care in Taiwan is great, and America should do the same thing. But I see these beggars on the streets with what look like treatable medical conditions and I think: we don’t see that where I come from, unless maybe it’s victims of the Veterans Administration. And now this here thread.

So what’s with all the crippled beggars anyway?