Ah-hee-yaw-nin, anna ma heb hena (That's my Arabic for Sometimes I Don't Like it Here)

There's no crazy like Middle Eastern crazy. Yesterday sucked for so many reasons, but we'll just stick to Saudi medicine.

I'm sick. Last week I went to the travel health clinic to get pumped full of poison before going to Tanzania. I felt the way you would expect for a few days, then started feeling super crappy two days ago. I was a good nurse and took excellent care of my favorite patient (me), then went to bed earlier than usual. I slept really well for the first three hours, then woke up feeling like my throat was on fire! A big glass of water and a couple tylenol later, and I was back in bed tossing and turning. Finally at 3:30 I decided that I wasn't going to work. I was going to the ER instead. My chest started feeling the way it always feels right before my asthma dominates my life.

I refilled my empty 1.5 liter water bottle and drank almost all of it on the way over. My throat still hurt, but not as badly as when I woke up. The told the triage nurse taking my vitals that we take my axillary temp because I had been drinking cold water, but what do I know? She sent me into the deserted waiting room, where I waited alone for two and a half hours before the doctor saw me. I told the doctor about my injections, about going home from work with a fever the day before, about my swollen glands, my white speckled tonsils and painful throat despite drinking three liters of water while waiting to see her, about having strep throat a few times in the past and this feels exactly like it, and about my upcoming asthma attacks. She looked at my vitals, and noted that my temperature was low, felt one side of my neck, and had me open my mouth. She said that she didn't see any whiteness, but she would get a throat culture. I asked her for a refill on some asthma medicine then she went away for awhile to... I don't know... chart, pray, see another patient, drink Arabic coffee with her friends, or whatever it is that prevents doctors from accomplishing a simple task in less than an hour's time.

When she came back, she handed me a few prescriptions. I asked her about the throat culture, and she told me that the throat lozenges would be enough.

Aaaaaaggggggghhhhhh!!!! I hate this place sometimes! I hate working with health care workers who suck!!! She sees me drinking incessantly from a water bottle, but doesn't think it will affect my temperature even after I tell her it will. She hears that I've had a fever for four days and it spiked the day before I came in. She doesn't check for symmetry in my neck so she has no idea how swollen glands are, and she either needs new glasses prescription or a new burqa that doesn't get in the way because those white spots were pretty obvious!

I left the ER feeling like I got ripped off, even though it was free. I feel like she was so bent on me only having a reaction to the vaccines that she didn't want to rule out strep. I'm going to do what I know you're not supposed to do. I'm going to self-prescribe some antibiotics, and I'll take them whether I have strep throat or not! Since I'll never find out otherwise, I'll just go ahead and say I've got strep.