Monday, June 10, 2013

Medical clearance, yay!


To a future peace corps volunteer, the words "medically cleared" Instill the same happiness as the words "would you like 1000 dollars". The medical aspect is by far the most daunting and so far the most frustrating part of my process to serve, and judging by the obvious rants that plaster the Future Peace Corps Volunteer Facebook group, I am not alone. They ask for about 5 shots, depending on what you had during childhood and stuff, as well as multiple blood draws and labwork, full dental exam with X-rays, paps for the ladies, eye doctor exams, and a very detailed health history where they examine every sneeze and sniffle you have ever had. Ok. Maybe it's not THAT in depth. Luckily, we are reimbursed up to a certain amount of money for each thing so it's not a whole lot of out of pocket expense (except the gas it takes for the multiple drives back to the dr office because you forgot something on one of the 5,000 sheets they have to fill out). I did my medical stuff very quickly. I made the appointments practically the day I found out what all I had to do (even though it was during a really busy time of my school semester, because I wanted anything to get me out of studying, even needles). I would have been done a month sooner, but no one told me (or my doctor, apparently) that live vaccines must be given on the same day. After educating my doctor in very harsh tones, I waited a month to received two more shots and was finally MEDICALLY CLEARED! No more doctors and anger! It's just smooth sailing from here, folks.


Moral of the story: do not administer live vaccines three days apart, but instead on the same day...your arm will thank you.