Wednesday, 30 May 2012

High bloodpressure ??

Something that makes me laugh here ever so often is how easy Myanmar feel sick. Whenever they have a slight headache, they go to the doctor. An upset tummy gets you a week's worth of medicine, and a small scratch or scrape needs to be attended to by the school nurse.

Admittedly, my reference pool is based mostly on school experience (students and teachers) and my home base of course. Here, the nurse is always taking everybody's blood pressure. For the simplest of reasons. When we have the flu going around, let's measure your blood pressure, slight headache... measure.. At one point last year I saw several of our office staff using the blood pressure thing on each other since they felt slightly queasy.

I find that soo funny. Of course, there are plenty of occasions  when more professional advice is needed, but not at the slightest 'I feel less good than normal'.

Today again. A fellow teacher was filling her cup at the watercooler. She told me she needed to take medicine. I asked her what the matter was. Upset tummy... What happened to good-old-'let's wait a day or to to see if I'm really sick?'. Maybe I'm just not culturally adjusted in this way.. 

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