Should I get ds2 tested for swine flu? And how/where?

[Greensleeves]

he's been sent home from school today feeling sick and has since vomited twice

he has a temperature and says his legs "won't let him walk" and his throat hurts

there is swine flu in other local schools although I haven't heard of it at his school yet (he's 4)

should I try and get him tested, or is it pointless?

I once had to see a gynae in the UK and was to be given a blanket to cover with... Not a done thing here in Italy where you are expected to undress in a little corner and walk to the bed half naked being blase'.

I'm one of those who has no qualms about stripping off, either. Big surprise!

Maybe it's having been married to a German - he had no problem with nude beaches, baths or the like.

Maybe it's that, well, they've seen it all before and I'm nothing to write home about.

I did have a really dishy GYN, however, whom I knew was gay (I worked in the same department as his partner), but whilst giving me an interal said, 'You have a really long vagina. I'm having to go pretty deep here.'

I have never quite worked out the American GYN thing, do women in the US spend a lot of time having their vaginas personally examined by their personal GYN? And why? when UK women don't bother?

You get an annual exam and they do an internal exam (to check for any abnormalities in the shape of the organs), a visual inspection (for moles, cysts, tumours and the like) and a smear test.

It takes next to no time.

Hi, we have swiney flu too here..

DS2 went down with it first, the GP said it wasn't swine flu, and he had to ride it out, he was so poorly..
Me and DH have it now, I'm ok apart from my chest hurts so much, and the cough is driving me mad.. DH is been hit hard.
DD1 has it and has been given Tamiflu because she has cerebral palsy

Ds1 and DD2 are ok atm...

School run has been 'interesting' I am dropping Ds1 and DD2 at the carpark and DS1 is taking Dd2 up to her class, I have park up in the carpark (no other parents are allowed in the carpark, I am as DS1 and DD1 have cerebral palsy) and wait for the kids to come out of the office with an adult at the end of the day, except they forgot today and DD2 was waiting for me... I ended up walking towards the office, keeping distance from all the parents and kids and waved at them....

Sparkly, sorry to hear your family has been hit by swine flu too.

It is pretty much the same here in Italy too fennel. Women usually see a gyn once a year. We like our doctors

hmm, I have been once in 4 years, for something trivial. Am avoiding the smear test reminder but will do at some point when work calms down. I don't like being a patient. am a very bad one, grumpy and opinionated (there's a surprise).

dd3 is officially deaf. At last, a Middle Class Excuse for her being so dopey, she's not dim, oh no, she's deaf...

If you don't like being a patient, you really won't like having cervical cell abnormalities.

I can promise you a trip to the colposcopy clinic is going to take way more time away from work than the smear test.

Please get it sorted asap, there's a poster on here who had to have a hysterectomy in her early 30s after her smear found her cancer.

But if she hadn't gone when she was due, it's not an impossibilit that she wouldn't be here with us anymore.

smeartestreminder

eeuough, smear tests

I have never had one, I know I should

fennel has your dd3 had another test? Or is she still deaf post-ear infection? ds2 has got to have "further investigations" but I don't think he's deaf, I think he just has selective hearing like his father

poor old ds2 is in a bad way, he seems to have gone right back to square one I wish I had put my foot down and kept him off today now.

and I am still coughing and snorting like an old tramp [self-pity]

She failed 2 tests, then had the cold/ear infection which rendered her really deaf, then went today to the hospital (with DP who forgot. the idiot, after waiting ages for the appointment, I had to text him and he had to rush and they were about 1/2 hr late but they managed to get seen.

but anyway, yes, glue ear. reasonably serious, she can hear but is impaired. we aren't surprised though, she's always been a bit on the edge of things, but it's hard to tell if that's just being the youngest in a very, ahem, verbal household. I thought she was a bit slow on the language fluency and cognitive reasoning, as you know, but maybe it is partly due to not actually hearing what's going on a lot of the time.

so she gets grommetts, probably. loads of kids have them don't they?

I try and be good about smear tests but I don;t like them. and, as I was an uptight nonsmoking teen who was scared of sex I feel that I should have that in my favour, in terms of cervical cancer risk.

Hope you and DS2 are feeling a bit better Greeny.

I am a bit confused about all this. The NHS website linked to early on in the thread says that vulnerable groups include

"Young children under five years old"

and then says that

"It is vital that people in these higher-risk groups who catch swine flu get antivirals and start taking them as soon as possible."

Soooo, why does no-one on this thread seem to have been taken seriously when their under-fives have been ill?!?

Maybe cos some of them are quite robust 4yos, which is a bit different from a newborn. but I don't think GPs and the NHS in general have worked out their position on swine flu, they just don't know yet, so anything they decide for sure could end up wrong at this stage. it's an unknown quantity.

What are grommets?

'I try and be good about smear tests but I don;t like them. and, as I was an uptight nonsmoking teen who was scared of sex I feel that I should have that in my favour, in terms of cervical cancer risk.'

Nobody likes smear tests, but nobody likes cancer, either.

Please read the thread, there are a couple of people on there who were very low risk who developed cervical cell abnormalities or cancer.

i am going. just a bit reluctantly.

not sure what grommetts are franca, something they put in a child's ear that make it hear better. maybe a tube?

Oh I see.
I'll be all fashioned and say: "she needs a holiday in a warm country". come fennel, come...

my mother had a grommet fitted in her late fifties [snigger]

loads of kids have them though, they don't hurt or anything - I think it's a sort of tube that drains fluid away

I wonder if ds2 has a gluey ear? He certainly has a gluey nose

and I have a gluey brain

My mum had a grommet in her sixties. Her ear was damaged by measles as a child and as she grew older she has increasing problems with it.

How's the house of plague today Greensleeves? (and haven't you been tempted to revert to your special swine flu name you were using a while back?)

Are you all taking it easy in the garden?

Franca, I am going to come to Italy, sometime. Just keep delaying on the basis that the girls get easier all the time. I had this summer sort of planned but suddenly we might change it all and go to the wilds of Scotland instead. all to do with helping DP's siblings looking after his alzheimery mother. they are bad at communicating and organising so we get stuck waiting for their decisions. when they can be bothered to inform us.

checking in
glad sanity has triumphed over The Protestant Work Ethic

Yes, how's the virus today? I hope you are feeling a bit better.

Fennel, next summer then. I'll find a nice sanatorium by the sea, you can take the greenies with you too.

Do you think she ignored us all and went back to work?

can you imagine all of us and all the greenies on an overland train to Italy?

fennel