Sick

So a couple of nights ago son Nick complained of feeling warm.  He did have a hot forehead and sore throat.  I told him to take Advil and drink fluids and go to bed, thinking it was a viral thing.  We made a trip to the Urgent Care on the following evening, however, as he was boiling hot, had slept all day with nothing to eat, and the back of his throat was a mess by my flashlight inspection.  He could hardly swallow from the pain. Luckily, with the new laws, we were able to put both our older kids back on Grant's company insurance plan so it was only $40 copay at the Urgent Care.  We were also fortunate to have missed the backlog of patients that had just cleared, it being 9:00 PM at that point.

I spotted the doctor on duty from the front counter--lo and behold, my old family physician since I was a new baby!  He had taken care of my own family, including Nick.  Dr. P recognized me too.  He said he loved to work in reply to my question as to why he hadn't retired, and the receptionist said "he has more energy than all of us". 

I told Dr. P the last time he probably saw Nick was probably when he was about 3-4 years old and needed his ears washed out from too much wax.  On the way to the doctor's office Nick had tied closed the hood of his jacket around his face and head, knowing what was coming.  I managed to get the hood off his head in the office with some coercion, but when it came time to lie still and have his ears cleaned, the doctor, his nurse and I were having to hold him down.  Dr. P did get a bit of the wax out but gave up after about five minutes of this and said there was no need to traumatize the kid!  After that I think we changed insurance companies and Dr. P was not on our plan. 

This time it was a lot easier for the Dr. to see in Nick's ear, as he said to me as he grinned.  Then when he shone his light on Nick's throat, he exclaimed "Oh, did you see that?" and called me over to take a look.  It was pretty spectacularly dotted with white yuck.  However, the swab came back as negative for strep.  Dr. P said the in-clinic tester was supposed to be 85% accurate, but he thought it was strep, and sent off the swab to the lab for the remaining 15%.  Some penicillin and throat spray and a couple days of rest later, Nick is feeling a bit better.  Good enough to go to a job interview this afternoon!  Luckily he is no longer contagious since he has been taking the antibiotic for more than 24 hours.  Still waiting to hear the lab results, though! 

It's nice to have stayed in my hometown and have this connection for so long.  Dr. P travels to other countries to provide free medical care, and has for decades.  He went to Haiti after last year's earthquake, the receptionist told me.  Good work, Dr. P!