Category Archives: Health,Medical

Health issues, medical services and pharmaceutical supplies etc.

Canal rooted, no more Mr.Grumpy

Posted on by

I guess it had to happen, but my tooth eventually went ballistic and I was in a lot of pain. But with no dentists in TL and certainly no dental X-ray machines, it was either go for tooth extraction locally or endeavour to get out of Dili and have it all handled properly. I chose the latter but not before getting THE doctor to load me up with anti-biotics and painkillers for a couple of days.

It wasn’t easy but I eventually got an appointment in Darwin, where (like many other places) dentists appear to be in short supply. I hadn’t actually had any dental work done since I was a kid and I was expecting some sort of discomfort. Having someone spend 30 minutes working away in your mouth with the mouth wide open is not exactly comfort, but once the anaesthetic kicked in, I felt no more pain.

The root canal job was done and I was told that once the anaesthetic wore off, I could experience some severe pain. I still had my smorgasbord of painkillers so I believed I had everything under control.

I decided to celebrate no more mouth and jaw pain with a lunch. However, my mouth/face was still under the influence of numbness. I ordered a noodle dish which had the suitable softness required to protect the temporary filling.

I warned the waiter that I might dribble uncontrollably and had to guide the glass of water to my mouth with both hands so that I hit the target. The food was great. By the end, my face was coming out of it.

And I never experienced any more pain at all once the anaesthetic wore off. Ball-tearingly brilliant !!!

Nehan-moras (or toothache)

Posted on by

I have always rejected buying lottery tickets as statistically, you have more chance of losing rather than winning. Now is obviously not the right time to start either.

So the gods decree that I must have a toothache. I have not had one of these since I was about 10 years of age. About 7 months ago, I had a dental check-up and was told “these are the best looking teeth I have seen in a long time”.

I have flossed my teeth a zillion times, used mouthwash 10 times a day and popped pain killers regularly. The first signs appeared about 3 days ago and it has got worse. At times, it is excruciating.

So I should go to the dentist, right ? I believe there are a couple of dental technicians in TL, but there are certainly no dental X-ray machines. I was told that the answer to all teeth problems here is extraction.

It is possible it is an abscess and it is even possible I pinched a nerve in my jaw (during a particularly ferocious yawn last week). So I will go see the doctor first and if he says go see a dentist, I will be winging off to Bali or Darwin.

Bairo Pite Clinic and Dr. Dan

Posted on by

Before you get to Timor Leste, if you try to do web searches looking for web sites here, it is a bit of a struggle. Apart from some of the government department sites and a couple revolving around tourism, there is not much else.

I found the Bairo Pite Clinic web site a long time ago and as an information resource, it didn’t seem too bad. But I do know that the information is a bit dated now.

http://bairopiteclinic.tripod.com

But living here, the Bairo Pite Clinic comes up regularly in conversation. It is actually a medical clinic run by the (locally) infamous Dr. Dan (Murphy). It is a private clinic run by Dr. Dan, who while some may say is a bit on the eccentric side, he sure is on a determined mission to do what he can for the Timorese people.

I actually couldn’t contain myself and had to see for myself. I had met an expat volunteer who works there and had a long-standing invitation to go and have a look around.

I hopped on my bike and headed for the clinic. It was only 10 minutes away but initially, I actually cycled straight past. It wasn’t quite like what I expected. Not helped by the sign falling down and little else giving away the real purpose.

But one couldn’t help noticing the 50 or so Timorese waiting outside for treatment. (The sign at reception says in Tetun “maximum 100 patients in the morning and maximum 70 in the afternoon”. I was told they do more than that. Dr. Dan does most of them himself.) Both the consultation and any required drugs are provided free (as far as I know). To many, Dr. Dan is a god. To some in the traditional medical community, he cuts too many corners. As in all things, both views are probably as correct as the other, depending on which side of the spectrum you are on.

I suppose the real point is “can anyone else treat so many people for the same price”. I will bet “no”.

To be honest, the clinic is pretty rough by western standards but I was impressed with the pathology laboratory (mostly because it had one at all) and the pharmacy seemed pretty well organised.

I know another volunteer at the national hospital so will stick my beak into that one as well. After these 2 medical institutions, there is bugger-all else. Bugger-all except for the quite extensive medical clinics provided by the Cooperativa Cafe Timor – the coffee growing co-operative. But thats for another day.

Food Safety 201

Posted on by

Having had a second visit to the doc recently re. my never-ending sore throat, I left with his final touching words “don’t worry, you’ll be back”. What he was referring to was bowel problems.

I was speaking to the owner and chef of one of the expat oriented bar/restaurants recently and he suddenly said “they will kill some one”. I replied “who?”.

He mentioned the main 2 supermarkets which are the central shopping points for the vast majority of the expat community. He specifically mentioned the well-known fact that most foreign foodstuffs were either approaching or past their use-by dates. He singled out the frozen foods as the worst culprits, citing use-by dates, the temperature of the freezers and the even nastier habit of thawing and re-freezing of these items. I also suspect a lot of the food lines have been market failures somewhere else and have been dumped. I also suspect production runs of sub-standard goods or labeling errors etc. to be amongst it all as well.

I must admit that I knew all this prior to arriving and was worried but you tend to forget about it after a while. Most of the expat bar/restaurants struggle to get staff to adopt basic food hygiene standards in food handling. You occassionally cross your fingers and eat out at a more local restaurant (usually run by Indonesians, Chinese, Indians, …)

You always hear stories about so-and-so is sick after eating at “…..” restaurant 2 days ago.

Lets not even mention those who have come down with malaria or dengue fever. A close acquaintance has been bed-ridden for 5 days now and dengue is suspected.

But the doctor was right, like everyone else, I’ll be back.

One week in the house

Posted on by

Life is actually quite a bit different now. Living in a house now means access to all that stuff I waved goodbye to 6 months ago. But apart from footwear, I am still wearing the same old clothes I have been rotating for months.

It means no more hotel breakfasts and it means buying food in order to have it to eat it. The first shock is the financial one when you spend US$400 on food and end up with … well, not very much. And I had already pretty much given up on any snack foods. I had also thought I had put on weight but I actually sent over a set of scales and to my amazement, I am 5 kgs lighter than 6 months ago.

Note to file : I have to start local market shopping rather than this expat supermarket stuff.

To be honest, I have been suffering from some unknown health problem of late (presumably bacterial infection), but must wait until the doctor gets back from his 2 weeks out of the country. Perhaps this is the real reason for the weight loss (or the self-prescribed anti-biotics).

Back to the house. I guess you have to expect teething problems when everything is new, but the wooden doors are cracking, there have been electrical problems, shoddy plumbing, no water pressure, cockroaches, really bad rising damp in the walls and we still lack a bathroom basin and gas cooker. When we decide not to eat out, we use the temporary gas cooker on the front porch. And we are still waiting on some key furniture deliveries for the living areas.

As I type, there is not one drop of water emerging from any tap. The tank is full, the pump is on. I don’t know. But one day, it will be sorted.

It has rained the last few days and after this, the mosquitos have come out in force around the house. It is almost impossible to remain unbitten unless you become a walking insecticide vehicle. But there are enough local stories of malaria and dengue fever to convince you that you just have to do it.

If you are into organics and the non-use of pesticides, me thinks you will not survive here. It is pretty difficult trying to impress with the latest eau de cologne, perfume or macho deodorant when you must by necessity smell like a roach bomb (ie insect spray).

No doctor … not again

Posted on by

Well, it seems to be happening all over again. I seem to have acquired a bad throat infection and by the time I decided that this was no normal sore throat, the doctor is on holidays again.

Getting a sore throat is no surprise. In an obviously new environment, there are bound to be whole new strains of germs etc. that the body has never seen before. Maybe I compound respiratory woes by cycling daily. The big surprise is even after 3 days of heavy rain, the city streets are quite dusty.

The dust at street level is not that much different to the stuff I breathed in Beijing at street level, although I am certain nowhere near as noxious.

So I call the OZ doctor and he has just gone on holidays and due back in 2 weeks. Yes, there are some local doctors, some Cuban doctors and probably an American doctor hidden away somewhere but that’s a whole new ball-game for me.

So I go down to the pharmacy and self-prescribe amoxicillin. I get a whole course for US$1 – no prescription necessary. I note the complete arsenal of drugs for all manner of gastric and colonic difficulties. I feel satisfied … I hope.

Tennis anyone ?

Posted on by

I have actually met a number of people here who have retired themselves from taking anti-malarial drugs. There are only 3 drugs that I have seen prescribed for malaria in this region – Doxycycline, Larium and Malarone.

I am no doctor of tropical medicine but it appears that doxycycline works well for short-term use but is not recommended for long-term use. It has an added advantage of being an anti-biotic so gives protection against a number of other nasty bugs as well. It is also not good for the skin.

Malarone is the newest and (to this point in time) appears to have the least side-effects, but has the disadvantage of being horrendously expensive compared to the other two.

Good old Larium tends to be the one used most – if you can tolerate it. It has a long history of side-effects ranging from nausea, to sleeplessness and in extreme cases, psychotic disturbances. It is not recommended for people with any history of mental illness. Initially I tried Larium. The doctor had warned that there was a 10% chance of noticeable disturbances to sleep patterns and dreams. The recommendation of avoiding alcohol was noted as was the observation that some people used alcohol to adjust the psychotic side-effects to their satisfaction. This sounded great.

Alas, I was extremely disappointed that I did not experience any psychotic wanderings but it did make me feel nauseous.

Back to tennis. Several people had said that if you do want to take a rest from anti-malarials, at least wait until you settle down and develop a pattern of behaviour designed to reduce the chances of being bitten. Using insect repellant as second nature is the first. Others include : wearing long sleeves or long trousers; covering the feet at night; sleeping with a mosquito net; having insect screens; regular spraying of house, car and office; minimising pools of water around the house; even eating Vegemite (Vitamin B is said to deter the little buggers).

Apart from the Vegemite, all these measures are a bit on the tedious side. But perhaps the most exciting response is the battery-powered “fly swat”. This little tennis racquet-like object (actually more like a racquet ball bat) has criss-crossing electrical wires which vapourise the little mosquito critters with a most satisfying ray-gun-like zap.

A word of warning – where I grew up, mosquitos were like Japanese Zeros. You could hear them screaming in on their bombing raids and usually felt them sticking their proboscus into you. But here, they seem to be much smaller and fly in silent-running mode and do their bit without you knowing. So there really are a lot more of the critters than I think. When I sat in a restaurant watching the barman waving his “racquet” about and obtaining full satisfaction every 5 seconds, I realised there is a life-long sporting vocation out there.

mosquito racquet

This provides many hours of fun if you are not a member of the Dili tennis club. Every house should have one.

More trouble in the guts

Posted on by

Unfortunately, I have had a relapse of my earlier gastric difficulties. The doctor had warned that this particular stomach bug had proved to be a tough one to defeat. And so it proved to be.

The result was similar to last time. The hotel room bathroom copped a huge spray and like last time, I seemed to lose consciousness again. I am not sure I have ever been as sick as this. I couldn’t scratch myself for many hours.

The medical result was a move to drug number 3 and paternal advice re. eating simply etc. etc. As it turns out, for the last couple of days, any food seems to disagree with my digestive system. Normally, you pay big bucks for this sort of dietary control.

Besides the positive weight reducing properties of this gastronomic regime, it turns out that I have no trouble processing alcohol. I got bitten by a mosquito yesterday and have been “forced” to move onto the gin and tonic. Someone pointed out that in order to get any anti-malarial effect from the tonic, you would need to drink quite a few bottles of gin. So !!

Give me drugs !

Posted on by

After 9 days, I have finally seen a doctor and I have the drugs. I guess you are thinking, “typical male … leaves it way too late before seeing the doctor” etc. etc.

Well, in my defence, it is not quite as easy as that. We knew that there was a doctor at the Australian Embassy who primarily looked after embassy staff, Australian Defence personnel and a number of other expats from English-speaking countries (including the Brits). However, we understood the doctor was on holidays and that meant no doctor. We also didn’t know the telephone number.

So finally, I hunted down the phone number and found that fortunately, there was a locum doctor operating over the Christmas/New Year period. The locum was the wife of an Australian expat who was leaving the country next week.

She confirmed that I had acquired the same gut infection that was sweeping through the entire community and no, it probably was not due to the restaurant I ate at the night before. Without treatment, she passed on the heartening news that it took from 6 to 8 weeks to run its course, but was still proving to be difficult to treat.

So I started the drug-related assault this afternoon, which with luck, will have me back in form for New Year. Alas, I am not meant to consume alcohol for 48 hours. Now, when was the last time that happened ?

Food Safety

Posted on by

I have travelled fairly widely and have a dubious distinction of having vomited in around 10 countries, thanks to dodgy food.

I thought I had a handle on the usual warnings about food safety and have often ignored what I saw as overly cautious advice, in order to experience the local scene.

NOTE : DO NOT READ PAST THIS LINE IF YOU HAVE A HANG-OVER, ARE PREGNANT OR SUFFER FROM LOW BLOOD PRESSURE.

I was severely ill after a crook fish in Turkey, severely ill after crook fish in Indonesia and severely ill after crook cui (ie guinea pig) in Peru. Don’t know what did it in Egypt. I think China escaped my regurgitative excesses.

I noted that local advice here seemed stronger than expected on the subject of restaurant selection. Not that I ignored the advice, but I think I have discovered why.

On Saturday night, I went to the UN Barracks XMas party where there were 4 local restaurants supplying the food. I made my choice with numerous others. The result was that I had mild diarrhoea for the next 2 days.

Perhaps I treated this affliction too lightly, as I opted to eat a fancy fish dinner last night. About 3 hours later, the stomach pains started. I retired to the bathroom where violent diarrhoea ensued. Then the vomiting, then it seems I passed out and was found 10 minutes later, lying on the floor in the bathroom in a pool of vomit and diarrhoea with blood dripping from my head.

Maybe I passed out and hit my head on the hard tiled floor. I don’t really know. But for the next 2 hours, I lay in the bath while nature took its course, until there was not an ounce of anything left in my body. It was not pretty. I could hardly scratch myself. For the cynics amongst you: NO, beer was not involved.