Going to the Hospital - China Style

Life In Nanchang: Why Visiting the Doctor in China Just Isn't the Same...

So you might wonder what you are looking at off to the right, huh? Well, that is a x-ray of my chest after I spent 4 hours at the hospital the other week. It seems in the last couple of weeks my body has decided to feign breaking down and/or giving up on me - or at least not work properly.

I started doing push-ups after a very long break from working out about a month ago. After a week of doing these push-ups I noticed an increase in chest pain as well as a 'popping' sound. I thought I would just ignore it and that after awhile it would go away; however, as time passed the pain increased and so did the 'popping'.

So I decided that I needed to go see a doctor in the hopes of getting an x-ray. The only problem in China - most of the time - is that you want to see a doctor, you have to go see the doctor. The other difficulty about going to the hospital is that they are crowded - since they both act as clinics and full-fledged hospitals - and lines really don't apply to China. I was blessed enough to have Mr. Li (our school driver) and Amy (one of our Foreign Affair assistant) help me with filling out all the information, paying for all the medical fees, and going to the all the right places.

Inside a Chinese Hospital

The bottom floor of a Chinese hospital kind of looks like chaos. People are moving in all directions and there voices are fighting to make it over each other. Surrounding the outskirts of the main entryway are tons of booths where patients are making payments and discussing/arguing about prices (I can only guess). Once you manage to file your name with the clerks on the 1st floor you will get a card which with to give to nurses so that they can swipe it on their computers so as to ascertain your identity. However, to do so, you must proceed to the 2nd floor where you sit and stand with everybody else at your appropriate station.

After waiting awhile you will be permitted to go beyond a couple booths guarded by Chinese nurses. I should note that the one of the nurses guarding the entrance to the doctors in our department was pretty hardcore and didn't stand for any non-sense. Mr. Li tried persuading her to let us in earlier, but his attempts were to no avail. Once past the nurses you will enter a room with a Chinese doctor who is seated at a desk, a computer, and about 10 people fighting for their attention.

Yes, it's kind of like a competition. It's kind of an awkward situation to be in. Several things start to race through your head: #1: I don't speak the language good enough to be involved in this kind of competition. #2: My ailment doesn't really appear to be that bad compared to the other people in this room. #3: Why is the room so small? #4. How does the doctor keep their sanity fighting off patients all day?

Those were my first thoughts after about 3 minutes in the room. When I entered the room, I counted 14 people including myself in a 10 x 10 room. After about 30 minutes of waiting and competing with other patients - by that I mean Mr. Li - we were directed to go to another room to get our x-ray. Mr. Li was pretty much my go-to-man all the whole 4 hours I was there. For hours he competed constantly with other Chinese to get me through my EKG and Chest X-ray. Mr. Li is an awesome guy (picture on your left).

Well after about 3 hours of running around, we finally made it back to our starting point, and were once again engaged in battling for position with the doctor. The added twist to this scenario was that SOS - one of my health care providers - wanted to talk to the doctor over the phone - my cell phone that is. So I call SOS - anxiously worrying that somehow we are going to be called any minute since there is really no way to tell. So I finally get the receptionist who connects me with her Chinese doctor in Beijing after about 5 minutes. Now I am just waiting for the Nanchang doctor...

So there we were, the three of us - me, the receptionist, and the Chinese doctor (who also speaks English) - chilling on the phone, waiting for our turn with the doctor in Nanchang, who is fighting-off 10 other patients simultaneously. At this point, I am quite uncomfortable so I tell Amy to to tell Mr. Li that we should have some added leverage in this competition since we now have a doctor on the phone from Beijing who has been waiting for 5 minutes. That apparently bought us the leverage we needed and I was finally able to hand over my phone and have the doctors from Nanchang and Beijing talk to each other about my medical condition. I mean, besides the fact that I couldn't understand a single thing that was being said, I felt pretty successful.

Plus, the good news was the my EKG and Chest X-Ray said that I hadn't broken my sternum. What better news could you want? And it only cost my $15 dollars. Yay!

So if you go to a Chinese hospital, be in for a surprise!