Siyuan and the hospital

So he's sick, the A&E doctor said to me. I nodded and started to tell him about Siyuan's high temperature.
Oh, he's vomiting, the doctor said. I looked down, and the remains of Siyuan's dinner was all over both of us. While I looked on in stunned silence, the doctor quickly took wipes out for us to clean (must be a common occurence!).

That began Siyuan's three days stay at the hospital. By the time we were admitted to his room, his temperature was at 41 degrees and he was lame as a duck. What started as a simple flu had escalated. While normally we would have kept him at home, the swine flu and the presence of Sihuai had our doctor advising us to bring him to the hospital.

We were put in the infectious ward for children, and shared a six-bed room with a kid that's probably about 10 years old. With just three of us and two huge air-cons bellowing away, it was a pretty cold night. Siyuan kept me warm as we shared the couch. He refused to sleep on his bed alone.

By the next day, his temperature had come down. Blood and a nasal swipe tests didn't reveal anything unpleasant lurking other than a normal flu bug, but the doctors wanted to be sure. So we stayed a third day. The doctors were concerned because of Siyuan's chronic coughing. (pollution and dirt in HK)

By the third day, Siyuan was bored out of his ears, and was happily pulling levers and wheels on his bed. We played hide and seek. At lunchtime, he would loiter near the door waiting for his food. We weren't allowed to wander around becos it was the infectious ward.

IF the experience of staying in a private hospital proved underwhelming in HK, the stay at Pamala, a public hospital showed why many still praised HK for having a first-class healthcare service. The care was professional and good. The furniture was older and the queues longer (45 minutes to collect his medication), but the doctors and nurses clearly knew what they were doing. The nurses showed excellent care as well as give us good advice.

The cost of seeing an A&E doctor and the three days stay? HK$200, or about S$40 or A$30. That's inclusive of the tests and chest X-ray they did. AMAZING.