Emergency organ removal in Russia
An adventure of pain, suffering, drugs and escaping death.
My last week in Russia was hell. It started on Tuesday with a stomach ache with diarrhea. The following day I skipped work except for a video chat client meeting, Thursday I felt almost normal and Friday almost resulted in my death. At first I thought my stomach pain was just food poisoning, I had after all eaten lots of sushi and drank some bad water on Sunday morning. (Never assume the water in a water filter has not been sitting there for months).
I remembered food poisoning to be less painful and a little more messy. 🤮 So when the pain got into the extreme on Friday after lunch, I decided that it’s time to go to a doctor. A Russian doctor.
Oleg (my Russian friend): There’s a private clinic just nearby.
Me: That sounds expensive.
Oleg: Not really, it’s just around 1' to 2'000 Rubles [~15 to 30$]
Me: That sounds wrong. If I just think of my doctor in Switzerland, I already pay more. Fuck, I just thought of him. Anyways, let’s go. I cannot stand the pain anymore.
We then walked 150 meters to the clinic. They sent us to another house, where I put three signatures on some Russian forms and immediately sent us to the third floor. I thought this cannot be right. Where is the waiting room? There is none. We just knocked and went in. The doctor, a woman in her forties was immediately worried when Oleg translated my story and she tapped some places on my belly. We went down to the second floor for some ultrasound. Again no waiting room, we just walked in and the doctor in there was expecting us.
In that rather cold room, I took off my shirt, a second doctor put the gel on my belly and looked inside it with the ultrasound. I saw absolutely nothing on the screen. The Doctors talked to each other, Oleg didn’t translate much. More doctors came and took over the ultrasound. To my surprise the mood in there was great, they were happy to have a foreigner in their clinic, laughing, joking. Okay, maybe my condition wasn’t so bad after all. Oh how wrong I was in that conclusion…
Me: So Oleg what’s going on? Am I pregnant? [As you can see, I tried to get in on the joking.]
Oleg: Something might be wrong with your — let me translate that — Darm [He translated it to German with his phone. In English it’s intestine]
Me: Which intestine? The long or the short one?
Oleg: I don’t know yet.
After some back and forth, we came to the conclusion that the correct translation is appendix [Blinddarm in German], while the Doctors came to the conclusion that there was definitely a problem, and I should undergo surgery. But first MRT. At this point in time, I called a relative of mine. He told me to order a blood test to check for an increased level of white blood cells. So on to another room, where an old woman was already ready to take my blood. Five minutes later I’m paying the bill for the consultation and the analysis, write something in English about being sure to want to leave the hospital on a blank piece of paper, give five more signatures on Russian documents and we drive to the MRT.
At this point I was positively impressed by the Russian medical system, but shocked by the fact that my stomach pain could be something so lethal. If this was indeed an appendicitis, I could die at any moment. And the pain was a constant reminder of that.
A trained physician might argue that death would not be instant and that even if my appendix would have burst at that moment, I might still survive and death would not be instant, but rather very painful. While that argument is valid, I want to point out that Krasnodar ranks 24th in amount of traffic jams worldwide. And the roads have lots of bumps in them, which directly caused me pain. So I was not very relaxed at that time.
Luckily the MRT was nearby. A friend came to pick us up with a car and after 10 minutes we reached it. Another 15 minutes later I was in the tube. I just had to give four more signatures on Russian forms and pay in advance 5k rub [80$]. The woman controlling the machine did not speak a word of English, so Oleg translated me whether I should breathe in or out from inside the room. I tried to keep my pain in check and thought about the legality of those forms I had just signed. In Switzerland these would not be legal if they contained anything unusual because I was in an emergency situation, did not understand what is in there, and the other person would have taken advantage of my situation. That’s how much I remember from my college law education. I still hope all that signing will not backfire at me because Oleg had also no time to read all that text.
The MRT clinic, which by the way only consisted of one room for the MRT and the reception area, gave us a bag with documents. We drove back to the clinic to get the lab results. On the way my friend tried to decipher what they had written. He was sure that all my other organs are in perfect health, but not sure what was going on with my appendix. Back at the clinic, we talked to yet another doctor who was able to tell us that my appendix had an inflammation, but was not fully covered with it. So he was suggesting to try heavy antibiotics for a day with a 10% chance of success and then the surgery.
My friend thought it would be best to drive to the regional hospital for this surgery. His line of thought for that: It does not matter if it is premium or how much you pay for this. What matters is how often a doctor has performed this kind of surgery, because it is a routine surgery. I agreed with him and do not regret that decision. So after paying 20 rubels [0.3$] because they prepared the forms in a special way and writing yet another note about how much I understand the risks associated with leaving this place, we sat in the car and drove one hour to the nearest hospital. This was the worst ride of my life.
Even though I tried to use the time to my advantage, by calling a ton of people with medical expertise, informing my family about my status, telling my wife that I love her, … (Side note: have you, dear reader, done that today already? I highly recommend to do it every once in a while.)
It was interesting to see how my friends used this time. By now we were four people in the car. They started a heavy discussion about how best to proceed. Then they made a few phone calls to some “important people”. I just understood that they gave them the number of our car. Oleg said: “They are expecting us”, and I felt a little safer. The driver, a young woman in her early twenties did her best to drive as quickly as possible while avoiding Russia… After one hour of painful driving we reached the hospital. And yes, they were expecting us. But only at the gate. 😅
At this point I could barely walk. But we made it to the Admission desk, I signed more forms and then we waited. Around five minutes. Then I was brought into an ice cold room, told to lie down on an even colder bed. They put some metal shackles with cables on my legs and near my heart in the position where you would put a defibrillator. I tried to tell the person responsible for the treatment that I am still alive and there is no need for reanimation. He just smiled and went on to take my blood. At this point I was not given any electric shock, but apparently also no treatment. I guess that’s a win, even though I had to pay in blood. I was still alive. We were sent back into the waiting room. 😶
Just a few minutes later I was called into the same room again (different cold pallet to lie on). Someone touched my stomach, realized that I was in a lot of pain and sent me back out into the waiting room. We were then brought into a room where they performed yet another ultrasound and more pushing into the areas of my stomach where it hurt most. But there was nothing I could do because that person who was causing me so much pain was apparently calling the shots in this hospital. Oleg translated me that they wanted to operate as soon as possible, apparently it was getting critical. At this point I was looking for anything that would reduce my level of pain. I would have probably considered removing my whole stomach.
While having this pain, I was thinking about how USA use “enhanced interrogation techniques” to torture people and how these people must have felt. I was experiencing intense pain for only a few hours, but those people being tortured went through worse for weeks. Bringing freedom to the world my ass.
I was then brought to a single bed room with it’s own bathroom. A nurse in her fifties came in with a huge smile on her head. Oleg translated me that she was going to shave me and that he told her that I’m not shy. So off we went into another cold room where I fully undressed not knowing that these clothes would be lost to me until the next day. The nurse then went on to shave my frontal torso. My friend made a joke about how sad the nurse was that I had already shaved some lower parts. I am still not sure if that came from him or the nurse, but these kind of jokes kept my spirits high.
I know that other people might see the jokes as sexual harassment, but I’m not one of those and happy not to be in a country where everyone assumes I’d be one of those.
The nurse that shaved me brought me into the surgery room. I remember rolling in my bed through the waiting hall. I feel like logistics could be slightly improved there. The nurse also seemed quite unsure what to do after bringing me through the barrier. She disinfected her hands briefly, looked a while for a cloth cap and put it on my head. Then she left and I was alone in a cold room on an uncomfortable bed. For around 5 minutes. Then the anesthetist came and rolled me into the surgery room and I moved onto an even harder bed. It felt like metal with a single piece of cloth on top. Ah yes, and the room was even colder. After reassuring myself that freezing to death on a surgery table seems unlikely, I took a look around: “Wow, four women in the room, no man, Russia is very progressive.” My misapprehension became clear two days later, when I met one of the two male surgeons.
After the surgery, they put me into some kind of emergency room for the night. This was the best part of my hospital stay. Everyone around me seemed a lot worse than me, there was always someone there to help me e.g. if I needed a cup of water, the bed was very comfortable and I was still full of drugs from the surgery.
I remember the moment of waking up. Oh, there is a tube coming out of my stomach. With at bag attached to it. Filling with my blood. Interesting. No one is telling me that there was a problem, so the surgery must have gone well. Or is it just because no one can speak to me? Around five hours later I met the only person in this hospital (including the patients) who could speak English. Our conversation went like this:
Me: Hey, can you tell me how my surgery went? Is everything good?
She: Yes, everything good.
Well... Okay then 😁
Later I found out that my appendix was about to burst and the surgery came at the last possible hour. Puh.
The following morning I was brought into the general hospital population. There were five beds in the room with as many patients, some of them with up to five tubes hanging out of their bodies. Most of them topless because of the heat. The only air condition was on one end of the hallway. Thankfully we were rather close to this side, so the heat was bearable.
My friends were already waiting for me with supplies. Mostly toilet supplies (While the room was kept meticulously clean and nothing was allowed on the floor, the toilet was in a very bad shape. And it was being used by other rooms too.). They also brought me a cup with two spoons. While I still don’t understand the logic behind: “Trust the hospital to perform a surgery, eat the food they provide, but use your own cup”, I followed their advice. And apparently everyone else had brought their own cup too.
The other patients were very friendly, we even communicated a little. I found out that one was unsure whether he was sick or not, one was going into surgery later, one was suffering a lot but I still don’t know what was wrong with him and the last one they called “phantom”. He was very pale and had way too many tubes coming out of his body. All of them were in their fifties. Quite a lot of information for the fact that they spoke not a single word of English and my Russian is limited to curse words. Sidenote to my Russian friends: Why do you think that is?
There is only one notable thing that happened during my stay in that room. They stopped giving me painkiller and antibiotics without a warning. When I asked for something, I received no answer. I thought, maybe they think I’m a painkiller addict? I did not want to seem like one (or become one), so I did not dare to ask more than twice. So I suffered. A lot. Not as much as before the surgery, but almost. The worst part was when they pulled out the tube from my stomach. It reminded me of this:
Thank god, my Russian speaking friend came about an hour later and was able to translate. Apparently my tiny allergic reactions to the previous two painkillers made them very afraid I might go into shock if they administer another one. Same story for the antibiotics. They didn’t know where the reaction came from. I told them to just try a different painkiller and then the antibiotics. They did. No allergic reaction. Finally some relaxation.
My time there was rather boring, but at the same time very relaxing. No one to speak to, time to sleep, handling the pain, forcing myself to get up and walk out into the floor once a day. Normal hospital life. What was different was the heat and the lack of fresh air. Thankfully one of my roommates had brought a window handle and was able to open the windows at night. The things you should provide yourself in a Russian hospital :D
In emergency situations such as these, money is (or should be) of no issue. But after a hospital visit, you always have bills coming in. So how is that in Russia? Well it turns out that my treatment was completely free. Paid by the taxpayers. What do I say to this? FUCK our medical system where rich and poor and young and old pay the same amount for their insurance. Take a look at Russia and learn from them. Here everyone pays for the hospitals and come on, be honest. Everyone benefits from a good hospital.
As a disclaimer: I might have received a slightly better treatment than the average Russian citizen because of connections.
How should Russian hospitals improve their service?
- During the weekends, there are almost no doctors available. Please even that out.
- Use some icons for everything you print.
- Teach all students some English, especially the medical staff.
- Reduce the shift length. 24–36 hours seems too long, even if you can get some sleep during the shift.
- Think about where and how patients, staff and equipment are usually transferred and construct / adapt the hospitals to include those logistics.
- There is some trend in Germany which says that doctors should listen for at least the same amount of time as they speak. I saw some doctors that did the extreme opposite. And yes, during the weekend they had less than 10 seconds per patient per day. Out of which they talked 8.
This concludes my adventure. One week later I feel pretty well recovered. I lost 6 kilos including my appendix. But I gained a lot of insight and experience. Life starts outside your comfort zone. So travel, take risks, get the fuck out there and live your life. And find yourself some friends. I am not sure I would have been able to survive this incident without mine. They were with me all the way and helped me wherever they could. It feels great to know that they have my back when I need them to.
