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Thailand has long been a tropical tourist attraction noted for its waving palms, beautiful beaches and its wealth of cultural richness. In recent years it has also become a destination for those seeking to improve and maintain their health. In effect, Bangkok has become a center for medical checkups.
A holiday featuring these reasons for visiting the Land of Smiles makes a lot of sense and can result in significant savings for those taking advantage of the country's inexpensive health attractions, a saving that might pay for the plane ticket for a never-to-be-forgotten vacation!
Critics can say it wasn’t always this way in Thailand and, of course, they would be right. But then we can also say neither did Thailand have jet flights back then either. Before I go on telling readers about a deal in medical check-ups, let me tell something about medicine in Thailand yesteryear.
The father of Thailand’s present king, HM, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, was studying medicine in Boston in the USA, where King Bhumibol was born. If we go back even before that, King Chulalongkorn, Rama V, was very concerned about medicine in the kingdom. When the British community petitioned the king in 1897 to open a clinic for freigners, for both residents and travellers, the king not only granted them authorization to open a nursing home but he also gave them a grant to help subsidize the hospital. That first hospital became the Bangkok Nursing Home. It was set up on the British sysem and the following year two nurses arrived from England to run the Nursing Home—Matron Crawley and Sister Hitchens. They set to work and in time established an institution. That was more thn a hunred yeas ago. In 1996, the Bangkok Nursing Home, now known simply as BNH, knocked down the old builing and in its place they erected a seven-storey modern, glace and concrete building with the latest, up-to-date technology.
Of course, old timers in Bangkok lement the passing of an era, but progess must march on. However, not all is lost. Those who are interested in the past, can actually visit the past. On the ground flloor of BNH is a museum that captures the very heart and soul of the old Bangkok Nursing Home. Entrance is free, and open to the punic, for those who like a bit of nostalgia.
The museum is a large, elongated room packed with everything imaginable. Once you sign in the log book you can begin your tour. To take you back to the past are old photographs, hundreds of them, framed, hanging on the walls. When you see the hospital bed of old with a mosquito net overhead, with a nusre mannequin in a uniform standing at the foot of the bed, you might think you are in a Hemingway novel depicting a scene from World War One. There’s an old Victorianne music box, every type of medical instrument once used from stethoscopes to blood pressrue gages. An old clock on the wall still keeps time.
For these who are really interested in the past and want to do research, there are old letters on file. The BHN Museum, it’s on Convent Road off Silom Road.
Now we come to the present, and what changes we see today. We begin with an offer by Thai Royal Orchid Holidays.
With the high cost of medical care in Europe and The US, many business and leisure travellers to Thailand are finding Royal Orchid Holidays can help them by referring to top quality, reasonably priced medical examinations. Three hospitals are involved: Bumrungrad, Ramkhamhaeng Hospital and Bangkok Hospital. All offer world-class facilities and internationally trained physicians who conduct detailed tests and analysis and issue a complete report within three days. The hospitals mentioned are actually like 5-star hotels with 5-star hotel facilities.
Royal Orchid Holidays offers three programmes that are defined in the ROH booklet Discover Thailand 2006-2007. For those who are interested in the programmes but can’t locate a booklet, I have listed them here as follows:
HEART CARE PROGRAMME
3-4 hours: AM Operates: Daily • ROHA35
Put your mind at ease and those of your loved ones with an extensive cardiovascular exam. Bangkok Hospital’s highly regarded Heart Care programme is carried out by specialists, who conduct preliminary and follow-up consultations, blood and urine analysis, chest X-rays, an EKG and an exercise stress test
SUPERIOR CHECK-UP
3 hours: AM Operates: Daily • ROHA6 Spend a morning undergoing an economical, smooth running physical examination performed by a proficient medical team at the first-class Bangkok Hospital. Complete blood and urine tests are conducted with primed results available the same day.
COMPREHENSIVE HEALTH EXAMINATION FOR WOMEN
OR MEN
7 hours Operates: Daily except Sunday • ROHA31 One of Asia's top medical facilities, Bumrungrad Hospital, offers an extensive, cost-effective medical exam, including abdominal ultrasound, chest and barium stomach X-rays, cardiovascular tests and an eye exam You’ll be screened for hepatitis,diabetes, cancer and thyroid problems and receive a lab analysis of blood, urine and stool samples.
Women receive heart and pap tests, an EKG and a mammogram. The men’s exam includes a heart stress test, EKG, PSA and liver function and heart tests.
In deed, everyone, here’s you chance to receive a world-class exam at a faction of a comparable routine in the west. All you have to do is check with ROH at any THAI office
Next week I have some more advice for travellers. We all like to travel with cameras, and even tape recorders. I have some tips on taking notes when you travel.
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BNH hospital
Pretty receptionist at door to assist you
Long view of the BNH museum
Uniforms once worn
Like in an old Victorian novel
Nurse in blue
Hospital beds had character of their own
Styles hardly changed
For service then, ring the bell
Put your name in the book
See the Discover Thailand booklet for full report
on heath care
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