Maxim hasn’t got any better today, so we took him to Dr.Simos’ office. Better safe, than sorry they say.
Dr.Simos said that it was a good idea to bring Maxim in for a check. We caught the early development stage of some form of bronchitis. Sounds scary, I know. But it seems that there are a few forms out there. Wikipedia page says that the best thing Maxim can do to get better is to stop smoking. Hello? I think they should stop smoking that crackpipe themselves. He’s not even eleven month old yet, and he had barely seen a cigarette on TV.
Dr.Simos went a different way. He prescribed Darth Vader treatment. Medical inhalations that is for those of you not in the know. Once again, I came across the technological progress breakthrough. In the old days, one would have to breath steam from the boiled potatos or some other “natural” medicine. These days are different. There is a properly developed medical lequid, which is used together with piston compressor. Piston compressors are, unfortunately, very expensive – (approximate price is somewhere in between 40 and 100 CYP). There are good news too though. Unless you need piston compressor on a daily basis, you can get away with renting one. Dr.Simos mentioned that every self-respecting pharmacy should have one for rent. I check it – and the first pharmacy I went to had just what we needed. No ID cards, driving licenses or any other forms of certification are needed to rent a piston compressor. And it costs only 1 CYP per day.
Additionally to Darth Vader treatment, the course of antibiotics was prescribed. We didn’t enjoy the idea at all, but Dr.Simos explained that it was really necessary. He also said that he chose the “softest” drug possible.
By the time we got home, my head was spinning from all the new information I have learned. That was the reason that I confused a thing or two. My biggest mistake was mixing a tiny portion of inhalation medicine with about 9ml of water. It was supposed to be used straight. Additional water means longer inhalation session. And that is very close to something only a hanful of people did. Consider the options – either you will have to entertain your kid for half an hour or so to move his focus from the mask on his face or you will have to run inhalation session while he sleeps, and the noisy compressor pretty much rules out this alternative.
The fact that inhalations should be done every 6 hours (6am, midday, 6pm, midnight) tells me that we will be sleeping a lot less during the next few days. This schedule doesn’t go very well with Maxim’s routine.
Anyway, the inhalation part went fine. But the antibiotics we couldn’t figure. It was a bottle with some white powder in it and a bunch of instructions in Greek. It turned out that we had to put exactly 9ml of water into the bottle and shake it well. After that a small dosage should be used once per day. For 5 days. Still, we had to call Dr.Simos for additional explanations on how to use the drug properly.
It’s sad that Maxim is ill again. I was told many times that kids are getting sick pretty often, because they have to build up their immune system. Maybe. But that is still pretty hard on the parents. I am glad that we caught this one early though. Hopefully he will get better soon. He looks so much better without Darth Vader mask…
Album location: /photos/2006/2006-01-20_POTD/