I recently admitted that we don’t have medical insurance. Still working on that (the holiday and the topic of the article kind of threw me off). In the meantime, I came down with a UTI. Nasty painful things!
So I bit the bullet and made a self-pay visit. Then we got generic antibiotics. I can tell you that I’m feeling 100% better now (still one day of antibiotics left). It was more expensive than I’d like but it was the right decision.
You see, an untreated UTI can get much much worse. According to the National Institutes of Health, an uncomplicated UTI can be resolved within a couple days of treatment. Like mine.
But if they move into the kidneys, UTIs can bring huge medical and financial consequences:
Severely ill patients with kidney infections may be hospitalized until they can take fluids and needed drugs on their own. Kidney infections generally require several weeks of antibiotic treatment. Researchers at the University of Washington found that 2-week therapy with TMP/SMZ was as effective as 6 weeks of treatment with the same drug in women with kidney infections that did not involve an obstruction or nervous system disorder. In such cases, kidney infections rarely lead to kidney damage or kidney failure unless they go untreated.
So neglecting your health to save money can not only have a bad effect on your health, it can cost you even more–for hospitalization and such. Or it can kill you.
Hearing this (and that most don’t just go away, they only get worse) got me off my butt and into the doctor’s office.
Hopefully I can prevent these infections in the future. I came up with a few ways:
By paying better attention to my body’s natural cues. By not being nervous about leaving the phone unattended for a couple minutes. By realizing that my health is more important than missing a call or looking silly for running to the bathroom frequently. I ignore my bladder too much at work.
Or by not being silly and telling myself I can’t get up from the computer until I finish the post.
Whatever ailments you come down with, take them seriously. Getting medical attention may hurt financially, but not getting medical attention costs more in the long run. And you’re going to get sick at some point, so be prepared.
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Also: drink lots of cranberry juice and make sure you use the washroom right after any, uh, “monkey business”.
Seriously, I swear by the cran. I’ve always been able to make UTIs go away by just drinking lots of juice when something starts to feel wrong.
Those too. 😉 But I already do the latter.
Cranberry juice is what I was going to recommend!!! I try to drink at least two glasses a day…I can’t drink it straight..ick. But the doc told me I could mix it with a bit of sprite/7up and make it better 😉
And tons of water! I drink about a gallon and a half a day, and in 29 years I’ve never had a UTI. My goal is to always have clear pee 😉 Yes, I go to the bathroom all the time (especially now that I’m pregnant, it’s about every hour), but I’ll take that over a UTI.
I can assure you that you do not want to have a kidney infection. Mine was pretty mild and cleared up within a few days, but still not fun in the slightest.
Ditto what plonkee said. I had a UTI that morphed into a kidney infection. I went to get it treated promptly, but the doctor’s office “misplaced” my test results. My doctor was on vacation and the office refused to call him.
I should have really pushed back to see another doctor in the office or gone to see another doctor elsewhere; I regret not doing that, because I ended up on Cipro for five weeks.
I should note that when I changed my primary care physician (which I did as soon as the infection cleared up), the office would not release my medical records unless I signed a waiver stating that I wouldn’t sue them. I refused to sign it, and they never released my records.
I bought some cranberry juice today and found that I like it! 🙂 I ate a few chocolate chips with it which was particularly good. plus lots of water.
I just finished my meds and don’t actually feel all the way better. So I’m going to call for a refill tomorrow. Just in case. It could be cramps or it could be hypochondria or it could be the UTI. I don’t want to take chances.
My girlfriend gets UTIs more frequently than average. Apparently once you’ve gotten one, it’s alot easier to get another. She usually has extra meds around just in case the UTI strikes again. The meds are pretty good about clearing things up quickly.
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