Health care in Germany

So I have been meaning to post this for awhile and with all the debate regarding health care in the US I thought it was timely! Thomas had sinus surgery two weeks ago. We had debated a bit about whether we should do it in the US over the summer but decided that there would be too much follow up care to do it somewhere other than where we live. We had several appointments leading up to the surgery, a week long stay in the hospital and have have many follow up appointments so far with more to come. I have been nothing but thrilled with the quality of care, the patience of all the doctors/nurses/staff with me and the language barrier, and of course the results of the surgery. My boy can breathe through his nose!!

There has been one very funny andecdote. We where sent home with a bunch of prescription for creams and nose drops. I dutifully took them to the apotheke (pharmacy) and had them filled. The pharamacist carefully went through what each of them was, what the proper doseage was and how often they were to be used. We got home and T settled happily on the couch to watch some DVD's in English- a week of German only TV had been a bit boring! It came time for some the nose drops to be administered. The directions had been that he needed 20-30 drops of this one medication. I began dripping into his nose. He began to scream. He took the bottle from me and said "Mom, I think these are painkillers and I only need them if the pain is bad." I wasn't sure about that but I stopped the torture. It did see a little strange that the medication to ease pain was causing more. We were going back to see the Doctor in a day so I would just ask him then. The next day he took an Advil for the pain.

When we went for our appointment and the Doctor asked how everything was going, I replied fine except that the pain killers were causing more pain than they were curing. He said, "ohhh" I explained that I could only drop 2 or 3 drops into his nose before Thomas complained that they hurt too much to continue. The Doctor smirked. He asked to see the bottle. I gave it to him. He chuckled. He explained, smiling, that the drops where to go into water and be drunk by Thomas. He laughed and said "Good to know that pain killers in the nose hurt though!"

When we went back for the next appointment I reported that all was fine now that I was putting the correct drops into his nose. I told him that all my German friends (and others as well!) had found my story very funny. He told me his had as well!!

I am not going to get political on this blog - I will leave all that debate for Facebook!- but I have to say the German Health Care system certainly has worked for us!