A trip to the hospital

in any language is scary, but in one you don't speak OR read is downright daunting. Elena has been fighting a cold with a nagging cough for a few days. Then a fever started. It would spike, decrease, spike again and decrease. On Friday afternoon, the fever was really high and the upper whites of her eyes were red - a "scratchy" blood red. I never saw anything like it. I called a Chinese friend and fellow English teacher Den (English name Annie). Her daughter is in Carlos' class and they also live on campus. I was hoping that she would go with me to the pharmacy to explain the symptoms and get some meds. She suggested and we agreed to go to the university clinic. Since it was the holiday week, they had a skeleton staff on duty and referred us to the local hospital. Yikes! I had visions of that awful The People's No. 1 Hospital that we visited last month. Oh, no....

Instead, we went to a nearby hospital called The Red Cross. It was modern, clean and professional. We did the usual up and down stairs and in and out of buildings to finally locate the proper departments. And this was with a native speaker! If we were alone, we'd stil lbe wandering those grounds! In the end, Elena was seen by a pediatrician and an opthamologist. We were given some eyedrops, eye cream and instructions to return to the university clinic to get an IV drip (the Chinese treat EVERYTHING (modern medicine vs. TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) using the IV drip). We returned to the clinic and Elena was hooked up to the IV. She was a real troooper and did well. Carlos was worried the whole time that she wouldn't be coming home for the night with us. We started on our way at 3:00 pm and arrived home around 8:00 pm. Total cost for the hospital, clinic, medicines and cab fare to and from - just under Y100 - less than USD 13. We're happy to report that she is now 1000% better. We have our active girl back!



Here's the unhappy camper at the clinic. We can only summize that the eye infection came from her touching her eye or from the water. The water IS toxic. She did get water in her eyes from Thursday's shower.


Our "Laynee" would only lay in her Papi's lap - no hard Chinese bed for this patient! Look at the first photo. You can see the "hard slab foundation" with only cotton batting on top.