Friday, January 11, 2008

A trip to the Clinic

TGIF... The sun was out today in Oslo and it was suppose to in the 30's. Kent and KJ both got a good nights sleep so we're 2 out of 3. I think she was feeling better and not coughing as much. She said she wanted to take a walk to Vigeland Park and get some postcards. Kent on the other hand, thought we should take her to the clinic. He called to find out where to go. He decided that he would show us where the clinic was on the way to his meeting in case we wanted to go later.

Last week we watched Sicko about healthcare in the U.S. It was an eye opener for me. Parts of the movie are about healthcare in other countries. There was even a part in the extras about the best country to live in according to the U.N. and guess what country it is? Yep, Norway. In part, because of their excellent healthcare (among other things.)

We decided we might as well take her as long as we were there. Unfortunately it is a private clinic, not public so it isn't free. The public clinic would be a pain to get to so we decided to stay. We filled pit a very small amount of paperwork and were sent to wait in the hallway where there were chairs. It was quite pleasant. After waiting a few minutes we were called into an exam room by a young woman. We didn't ask but we thought she was a physician's assistant. She spoke English (I forgot to mention everyone does, at least it seems like it) and asked Kayleigh many questions about what was going on with her. She basically has a rattling cough and has had it for over 10 days. She recommended doing a blood test which would let us know if it was viral or bacterial. We went back to the hallway. A few minutes later another friendly woman escorted us into the lab and took Kayleigh's blood from her arm which was a first for KJ. After she told her she could choose a present for being a good patient. KJ choose a troll, go figure. We went back to the hallway and then back to get the results. KJ has pertussis which is whooping cough. It is a bacterial infection in the lungs and causes an awful whooping sounding cough. She prescribed an antibotic for 10 days. Off to the apotek (pharmacy) to get the medicine. Kent aslo got a netty pot. He thinks he has a sinus infection.

The trip to the doctor including the netty pot was around $200. I'm thinking this is less than we'd pay at home if we didn't have health insrance.Regardless I'm glad we went especially since KJ is going to start school on Monday.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

What the heck is a netty pot? Never mind I found it on YouTube. It doesn't look very comfortable to pour water through your nose!