Armpit pain - flying long haul next weekend

[BobLobla]

I’ve got a pain under my right armpit - feels sore like a spot does when it’s brewing or like when your bra wire has dug in. It’s got more painful over the past week. There’s no lump (that I can feel) and most of my googling recommends a warm compress and painkillers and it should go away on its own.

but I’m going to the US with work next weekend and I’m a bit worried in case it hasn’t gone by then or is a cyst that will somehow pop on the plane or something. I don’t want to waste GP’s time but am thinking I should maybe try to see the doctor before I fly?

You should see your GP. Shingles starts like that. You don't want to be looking for a doctor when away. At the very least you need some strong painkillers.

but also if they think it could be anything else, and put you on a waiting list, then you might screw up your travel insurance! Maybe if work is paying, that's not such an issue. But the minute you have anything 'undiagnosed', no matter how minor it might be in the end, you can struggle to get your insurance to cover you. And for many policies, you have to tell them if anything has come up before you travel. It's awful, but you have to weigh up the chance of wanting to be seen and getting treatment before you go, which might be important, or whether to wait til you come back in case it's something that puts you on a waiting list, for example (like for a scan or whatever), even if it's just to exclude something. It's really frustrating that travel insurance rules mean that you have to think about these things and whether to be seen or not. I was on a waiting list for almost a year and really struggled, and wished I'd never mentioned something to the GP!

This is why you must organise and pay for travel insurance at the same time as booking your travel. Then you are covered for anything that happens prior to travel.

But that's not my point here. That lets you cancel the trip, so that part is OK, but you aren't covered if you do go away. There are plenty of things that are not going to stop you travelling, but if you're on a waiting list, you have to tell the insurers, and then you can't get covered and/or they'll stop you being covered. So if the GP says oh it's fine, probably just a little cyst, not going to stop you travelling, but we'll put you on the waiting list for an ultrasound just to check if it's more serious - you have to tell the insurance, and they may stop the coverage, because you are undiagnosed. So then you have to choose to go away without coverage - or if you're lucky, you might be able to get coverage for everything except that condition, but then if it turns out to be something not serious enough to stop you travelling, but that goes wrong when you're away, you are seriously out of luck (especially in America). Once you have the diagnosis, you can pay extra for it, and that might be fine, but it's the waiting period for less serious things that can cause huge huge hassles, especially these days when the waiting times for scans or whatever can be months long.

Maybe wait a couple of days and reassess.

That's not true.

We have an annual policy and because dc has been referred for some tests midway through the policy, the insurance company say we now have 'disputed cover'

How long will you be in the US for? If you’re just there for a couple of days, you’ll probably get away with doing nothing before you go (unless it gets much worse in the next day or two) and seeing a GP when you’re back in the UK. But if you’re going to be away for longer, it’s more risky to do nothing before you go.

What would happen if you have to postpone or cancel your trip? Is that possible or will it cause too much drama at work?

This isn’t really relevant to the OP. She’s travelling for work so will be covered by her employer’s insurance and will need to check the T&C for that as they can be quite different to those of a personal policy.

That is very poor. My annual policy is valid for one year regardless of any issue that arises, as long as the medical questionnaire was up to date at the point of renewal.

Sadly that is usual for any policy that has any sort of complex issue - you can get away with annual policies that don't require updating if you have nothing serious at the time, just fairly ordinary pre-existing conditions or nothing, but if you have more complicated things, then most policies insist on updates before you travel and can stop the cover. Also even if you have an annual one, if you then happen to be on any waiting lists when it expires, you can't renew it, even if you have a trip booked for e.g. a month later, so you have to plan trips and expiry/renewal dates very carefully!

Again hopefully not relevant to OP as she should have a work policy, but probably needs checking to find out what the rules are, as you don't want to mention something to the GP and then have it on your records, if you ever need to use the cover and haven't mentioned it.

Thanks all. I managed to get a GP appointment this morning and she’s pretty sure it’s ligament damage (although she did mention shingles as a back-up if a rash suddenly appears). I’ve already got my insurance as I’m freelance. I’m out there for 10 days so let’s hope everything settles down.

Hope your trip goes well @BobLobla and thanks for updating us all. Much appreciated.