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Health Care in Poland

Monday 30 May 2005 | 0 Comments

is a joke.

To begin with, there’s no private insurance to speak of because its’ too expensive. Insurance in general is expensive here. Almost no one here has his car insured against theft. Considering the fact that an inexpensive new car would cost me twenty months’ of my salary, that’s ridiculous.

There is free public health care for everyone, but that’s only in theory. In practice, a lack of physicians and a lack of motivation (i.e., low salary) on the part of practicing physicians mean long waits for appointments (a matter of months sometimes) and ineffective services.

When you visit a doctor in a public clinic in Poland, you probably won’t be asked many questions. The doctor will get his pittance no matter how well he serves you, so he’d just as soon send you on your way so he can get through the multitude of patients he has for the day. A cursory glance, a question or two, and then whip out the prescription pad.

Not only that, but supplies are non-existent. You have to go buy your own anti-toxin, for example, if you step on a nail. If you’re coming in for an extended stay in the hospital (i.e., to give birth), you have bring your own toilet paper. And so on.

So public health care is dismal. If you want to get better, you go to a private clinic — and pay.

Personal case in point: I had throat problems a couple of years ago. Several visits to laryngologist working at the public hospital produced few results. One visit to a private laryngologist all but solved the problem. The difference: she didn’t just jot down a prescription after a cursory glance at my throat. She performed a detailed examination, with lots of questions, then provided not just a prescription, but a regimen for throat care.

The problem is pay — or lack thereof. Doctors are flooding out of Poland, mainly to Scandinavia.

The Shot

Sunday 29 May 2005 | 0 Comments

Kinga stepped on a rusty nail Saturday. Never mind how — that’s a story in and of itself.

This is not the story of the rusty nail, but of getting the tetanus shot.

We went to the local health clinic, only to find that they didn’t have any anti-toxin for tetanus shots. “You’ll have to go to Nowy Targ,” which is about thirty minutes away.

We got to the hospital in Nowy Targ, got Kinga registered, and waited. Within a few moments, someone took Kinga back to some room. In the meantime, I wandered about the waiting room, reading this and that. There was an article in the local paper, enlarged to the point of exaggeration, which reported that the Nowy Targ hospital had been ranked in the top 100 in Poland — number 69 to be exact. I scanned the article — boring — and then sat back down.

Kinga emerged a few minutes later rubbing her arm and holding a slip of paper.

“That was fast,” I thought. “Kudos to the NT hospital for fast service.”

“We have to go to the pharmacy,” she said.

“What for?” I asked.

“They don’t have anti-toxin either. I have to buy it myself.”

Trip to Slovakia

Saturday 28 May 2005 | 0 Comments

Survival Mode

Tuesday 24 May 2005 | 0 Comments

And out of the blue yesterday, a tolerable lesson with The Class. What makes them tick? I have no idea. Such a strange group of kids. Monday was living hell; yesterday was survivable, even decent. But still, the same old folks were up to the same old game – gap speaking activity turned into a copy-your-partner’s-worksheet activity. And of course the usual suspects didn’t come to class with anymaterials whatsoever, then use that as an excuse to sit and draw all lesson.

I’ve finally realized with that class that I simply can’t make them learn, and so I concentrate now on the five to seven students (depending on their moods) who want to learn, with the four hardest-working students (and therefore, best behaved) at the front of the room. I talk to them, and glance at the others from time to time, in case someone there gives a crap. Most of them don’t, it seems.

The other day, I all but told them this. I said that I really didn’t care whether they care anymore, and that I’m going to put all my attention on those who in turn pay attention. “Tak jest,” said the best student – a young man who has, I believe, one B (a 4 in the Polish system) this semester.

I worry this might be self-defeating in the long run, and not a very good classroom management method. Still, I’ve got about three weeks of school left, and I’m just in survival mode with them now.

Ride to Zab

Saturday 21 May 2005 | 0 Comments

-ation

Friday 20 May 2005 | 1 Comment

I did a lesson on word formation with a group of juniors today. We worked on turning nouns to adjectives (i.e., beauty to beautify) verbs to nouns (i.e., improve to improvement), and then I stunned them with the news that they were going to learn more than a thousand new words during the lesson.

It's an easy lingustic trick, really. Words that end in "-ation" in English usually are virtually identical in Polish, only with an "-acja" (pronounced "aat-see-ya") suffix, or a variation.

"revolution" is "rewolucja"
"inflation" is "inflacja"
"distribution" is "dystrybucja"

I don't think I need to elaborate on what word young Rafał blurted out in class...

Babia Gora

Thursday 19 May 2005 | 2 Comments

Kinga and I decided one of the last things we wanted to do before leaving for the States was to take a trip around the most prominent geographical feature of this area: Babia Góra, roughly translated “Lady’s Mountain.”

Babia known as “Królowej Beskidów” (“Queen of the Beskidy”), and is the highest mountain (1,724.6 meters above sea level – 5,658.4 feet) in the Beskidy mountain range, which is in turn seen as a part of the Carpathian Mountains (Wikipedia: Babia Góra||Beskidy).

Babia is an odd mountain, in that it looks radically different from different locations.

I see it daily from the south, and it’s a claim, motherly looking mountain that looks peaceful and wise. From the north, though, it’s almost violent looking and feels more like the Tatra range further to the south.

Living in Lipnica so long, I’ve been to Babia many times, though due to a persistent knee injury, I’ve never made it to the top.

Our route took us around the eastern edge of Babia to Zawoja, then north to Sucha Beskidzka.

Nie wiem, jak to się stało, że jeszcze nie objechaliśmy Babiej dookoła. Już trzeci sezon jeździmy, mieszkamy u stóp Babiej i jak do tej pory nie wpadliśmy na to. Być może dlatego, że te drogi są nam znane, zbyt oczywiste. Ale okazuje się, że druga strona Babiej Góry to istny raj dla nas i gdybyśmy zostawali dłużej, to na pewno wybralibyśmy się jeszcze raz nieco inną drogą. Z Zawoi jest kilka ciekawych skrótów w kierunku Koszarawy i Jeleśni. My pojechaliśmy przez Suchą, bo chciałyśmy zobaczyć zamek. Od momentu, kiedy zaczęli robić modernizację ewidencji w Raciborzu, co jakiś czas tamtędy przejeżdżałam i miałam ochotę zobaczyć, co też oni tam mają za zamek w tej Suchej.

A Babia od strony Zawoi wygląda inaczej, rzeczywiście groźniej, szczególnie teraz, kiedy jeszcze leży na niej śnieg. Widok od Orawy jest dla mnie bardzo uspokajający — taka nasza Babia siedzi sobie i obejmuje Orawę od Lipnicy Wielkiej aż po Zubrzycę.