no sinusitis :D

lucky me.

after 3 months (exactly yesterday!) here in southern cone, i've already had the pleasure of going through 1 box of claritin and visiting doctors in 2 different countries, yay! i think it's been my eternal winter this year - i just haven't been able to be my normally pretty healthy self. as we approach september, though, the month that everyone tells me signals the beginning of spring, i'm getting more hopeful :) i'm also planning to go to the pharmacy tomorrow to buy an awesome multi-vitamin that will hopefully build up my body's reinforcements :D but would this topic really be complete without an account of my experience of going to the doctor in argentina (since i've already written about chile)? didn't think so ;)

so after a busy weekend of going out every night and fun-filled days, my body wasn't having it. i woke up sunday morning with a sore throat and the dread that comes with knowing the next step... yup, a cold :( i immediately started with my claritin regimen, hoping to ward it off in time for my trip back to santiago on tuesday (which ended up being thursday, but whatever). no such luck. i woke up monday morning with my right eye so swollen i almost couldn't open it and a face completely in pain from sinus pressure. not to mention no appetite (that's when you know something's up) and just a general feeling of awfulness. tuesday followed suit, but with 2 swollen eyes. by wednesday, i wanted to go to the doctor, just to feel better. i arranged with my insurance company to attend a place called hospital alemán for the next day (the guy remembered me, ha ha) and that was that. they were going to send documentation to the hospital saying that they'd pay for everything so i wouldn't have to front the money - good thing, since my wallet with all of my credit cards (aka backup money) got stolen in the metro on wednesday...

well, i arrive to the hospital, which was really nice, by the way, and am told very nicely by an english-speaking clerk that they haven't received the documents from my insurance company and i'll have to front the 145 pesos if i want to be seen by the doctor. hmmm, no. my salary doesn't cover unexpected doctor's visits, unfortunately, and i think i'd prefer to eat this week. i leave and go to a locutorio down the street to call my insurance company - turns out they sent the documents to the right place, wrong person. i go back to the hospital and find that my trusty english-speaking person is gone - time to bust out the spanish and make sure i get treated for the right thing, ha ha ;) after speaking with someone else for about 10 minutes, my documents are finally located and i'm sent to a doctor, yay! this whole process took about 1 hr, just for reference :)

i go in to see the doctor, who kisses me as a greeting - very normal here, but dr./patient in a hospital clinic? not so sanitary... anyway, after doing the normal doctory things that the guy in chile did, pronouncing me officially with sinusitis, this doctor asks me to go downstairs and get an x-ray done...of my face. i tell him i can't pay extra but he insists my insurance will pay for it. ok, cool. but then he keeps my form, the very important form i worked so hard for. i go downstairs and wait in a line, only to have the woman tell me that she needs my document from the insurance company. i tell her the doctor has it upstairs. i wait 20 more minutes. the document arrives and i go to x-ray my face - first time i've ever had that done. easy and painless, and now i have a cool picture to show for it ;) i then go back upstairs, but not before spending about another hour for this whole process.

i go back upstairs to the doctor who glances at the picture and declares me overall healthy, just heavily congested. he then opens a drawer and starts handing me medicine - for free! that was something that i had been worried about, especially without the support of my backup funds - all of a sudden, i'm gifted with decongestants, nasal spray, and antibiotics (i'm not sure why since i suppposedly wasn't sick) - thank you, hospital alemán :) thank you, argentina!

so after 3 hrs, i arrive back in the office with my goody bag and my first doctor visit handled completely in spanish! i was proud of myself, and it makes me feel better knowing that i can do it if i need to and don't need to rely on someone catering to me. it's something i've been trying to get away from here, having to depend on people in other parts of the world that speak english - i like knowing that i can do what i need to do as it's done here, more independent :)

...and the nasal spray has cleared me right up :) also 27 hrs of rest on my journey from buenos aires to santiago, but that's another story.