Updated July 2, 2020
I went to a Chinese hospital a few days ago (June 2020). I was feeling breathing problems. Frankly speaking, I was afraid if coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) had hit me.
Here follows a brief report. A personal report…
Back in the late January 2020, I felt breathing issues. Often, I’d feel heavy and deep breathings. Since this was the shit time when COVID-19 was just detected, and was spreading ultra-fast in China, I was afraid to be infected by SARS-CoV-2, the COVID-19 virus. I thought I had shortness of breath, a key symptom of COVID-19 infection.
However, as far I understood the COVID-19 symptoms, I didn’t have any fever (our body temperatures were checked every day, a couple of times). No coughing, no other symptoms of COVID-19 I ever have had.
Also, every morning when I’d get up, I’d be totally fine. As the day would pass, I might feel some breathing problem, not every day though. Sometime, switching the air-conditioner on would lead to start of my heavy breathing. It was freaking scary…
Overall, I was really worried if COVID-19 shit had struck me. However, I didn’t have the courage to visit a hospital. The hospitals in China, after the pandemic, were obviously overcrowded and I was afraid of being infected in the hospital, if not already infected.
My colleagues told me that I was just being too worried about the infection (since I didn’t have any fever). While searching on the internet, I found there were indeed some correlation between “worrying” and “breathing problems”.
Coming in June, my breathing problems still persisted. Sometimes I felt the breathing issues was becoming more problematic. However, I never had a fever in the last five months.
Finally, in June, I visited a Chinese hospital.
Although the hospital was crowded, it was nicely maintained, very clean. I was able to get an appointment to see a doctor (breathing specialist) for RMB 10.
The doctor did a normal check up and felt I was just fine.
To be sure that my lungs worked properly, he recommended me a CT scan. Further, the doctor asked me to get back to him after the CT scan was done.
I paid ~RMB 400 for the CT scan and waited in the queue for my turn. There were quite many people in the queue.
After about 1hr of wait, I was in the CT Scan room. It hardly took a couple of minutes to perform a CT scan for me.
I went back to see the doctor. Although the full report of my CT scan wasn’t available immediately, the doctor could see the (partial) report on his computer.
I was declared to be fine.
The doctor gave me medicine (10 tablets, ~RMB 40): one tablet/night, before sleeping.
I was asked to visit the hospital after I had completed the course.
The whole exercise was finished in one afternoon.
After eating the medicine, I do feel better. However, I am not totally fine yet.
The good news is that I still don’t have a fever. Basically, I have enough reasons to feel that I am not affected by the novel coronavirus. 🙂
Also, my overall experience to visit Chinese hospitals has been very positive. Specifically, China’s hospitals have all the state-of-the-art facilities. The prices are quite affordable. The doctors are friendly and knowledgeable.
Did you ever feel you were infected with coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19)?
