Travel HOWTO: shots I gots, and altitude data sites
Hey, speaking of vaccines...
I've tried many different sources for travel medicine in the past. Once, I went to the CDC (not to be confused with cDc). Some experienced travelers I know swear by the CDC for travel immunizations: their prices tend to be low, and who isn't used to the federal government sticking you in the ass already, right? But the one here in LA seemed very poorly managed -- and they won't always have what you need for remote places with exotic bugs. I have also used regular old general prac doctors, and the University of Southern California's travel clinic.
So far, the best experience I had was the place I used when preparing for this most recent trek: Healthy Traveler Clinic in Pasadena, a quick drive from Hollywood. The prices weren't always the absolute cheapest, but they were lightning-fast, always had everything I needed, were super well-organized, and *wired*.
I asked the administering physician, Brian Terry, whether it would be wise to pack altitude sickness meds for certain spots along the trek. I knew Tibet would pose problems, but wasn't sure about some of the sites in Northern India.
So while I'm sitting in the chair where he's just poked me full of rabies shots, he whips out his laptop and logs on to a website I'd never heard of that lists altitudes for darn near every city in the world: fallingrain.com. It takes a while for Dr. Terry to find the small towns I'm headed to (and there are a dozen possible spellings for "Dharamshala") but we do. Based on that data, he determines that altitude sickness will not be an issue anywhere I'm going -- except for Tibet.
More on how much altitude sickness sucks later, but above is a scan of my vaccination card. I think the rabies shots might come in handy more at home in LA than anywhere I might end up going next.
Getting shots and horsing down live typhoid bugs are among my least favorite things in life. But I'm glad I found this clinic, and I'd use them again. They even have a store on-site (and online) where you can buy mosquito netting, emergency mylar blankets, water purification kits, and the like. Plus they give you chocolate candies after they're done jabbing sharp syringes full of toxins into your flesh, which is, you know, thoughtful.
3 Comments:
Hi Xeni...
Re: altitude sickness. I'm looking forward to your post on that subject. I've always had very bad experiences at high altitudes and I'm now looking at a trip to Machu Picchu soon and I'm very interested in finding out what your experiences were with altitude sickness medication.
Good luck on your journey! I recently traveled to India to do volunteer graphic design work for an animal rescue organization in Andhra Prasesh. If you go near Bangalore, I highly recommend visting Puttaparthi. There's an ashram there as big as Disneyland, and just as cultish!
You can see my photos, videos, and hear field recordings from my trip here: http://www.mexist.com
p.s. Don't worry too much about malaria, if there's a real threat, you will hear about it from the locals. The side effects from those pills aren't worth it, just keep yourself covered up and burn coils at night.
After all those shots you might be able to take some side work as a pin-cushion. I had one of those cards on my first trip over here, but now all I do is make sure that my tetnis is up to date. I step on more rusty nails here than I ever thought I would. Never had malaria, and I sort of think that larium is a lot worse for you.
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