French Hospital

Today we went to the French hospital in Hanoi. It was a very nice hospital, very clean and everything in Vietnamese, English, French. Of course Thao was very worried about taking blood, and poor her, she could not eat anything for breakfast. What is funny about that hospital is that they make you run around a lot. We had to wait for the doctor checkup, then Thao had to pee in a cup, then pay for checkup. The doctor said he had to do two blood tests, one to check blood type and anything wrong, and another to check the sugar levels in Thao's blood after drinking some sugar water and waiting for 1 hour, to see if there was any problem with the baby growing too fast. So we went downstairs for first blood test. See, nothing to worry about Thao! Then go to pharmacy to pick up a vaccine. No wait, have to go to the cashier to pay first. Okay, back to the pharmacy to pick up the vaccine. Yes, you actually have to hold your own glass vial of vaccine. It was for Tetanus. Then walk to the other end of the hospital to get someone to give you the vaccine. Then wait about 45 minutes. Then walk to pharmacy again to pick up Calcium tablets. Oh wait, pay first. Okay, back to pharmacy. Then back to other testing room to take blood one more time. Thao said the first blood test was much easier because the French nurse was nice, but the second time the Vietnamese nurse did not know what she was doing and it hurt a lot. So now it was almost 1pm, and poor Thao couldn't eat anything yet but still had to give blood two times and take the vaccine needle.

One thing I have gotten used to in Vietnam is the difference prices for locals and foreigners. The contract for delivery is $770 USD in Vietnamese, while the English version quotes $1200 for the same thing! Next time I will have to check the French version, maybe it is cheaper! :)

Thao was scared to get that Tetanus vaccine because she heard from a lot of people that it can hurt sooo much and the baby seems tired too and doesn't move for many days. And the doctor even said that sometimes the arm can get swollen so big like a tennis ball or she can get high fever and have to come back to the hospital. But it seems she is fine, after eating lunch we went home and had a nice afternoon nap for a few hours. And now actually the bloodtest arm is hurting more than the vaccine arm! But she still has to go again for another dose of the same vaccine in 1 month...

P.S. Thao was wrong, she only weighs 59kg, not 61kg. And maybe now she was wearing heavy clothes for winter....

And we spoke too soon, last night was terrible for her. Her arm from the bloodtest was blue and hurt, from the French girl it seems, maybe the vnese girl was better after all. And her vaccine arm started to hurt sooo much and hard for her to breathe all night. Katie seemed tired too, not moving much. So everyone on the internet complaining about that vaccine is right!!