Philippines, Don't Break A Bone On The Weekend

So I recently learned an important lesson in the Philippines: don't break a bone on the weekend.

In the US or other more developed countries, a broken bone would mean a trip to an emergency room where you'd receive an x-ray and some sort of plan moving forward (an on-call orthopedic specialist would be called in). Depending on the type and severity of the fracture, you’d get the bone set, put in a cast, and perhaps a referral to discuss surgery if needed, etc.

It's a little different in the Philippines. Recently, I witnessed firsthand what happens when you break a bone. In this case, the collarbone. The injury happened during Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu training. It was a Friday night. Apparently, going to the emergency room of any local hospital isn’t an option, as there wouldn't be any doctor available to deal with a broken bone.

The recommended course of action was to keep ice on the injury to reduce inflammation, take over-the-counter pain medication for pain management, and find an orthopedic doctor in the morning.

Come Saturday morning, the hunt began. We left around 7:30am.

Stop #1: Mactan Doctors Hospital, Lapu Lapu City.

After parking, receiving two wrong answers to the question, "Where can I find an orthopedic doctor?", buying masks (because they are still mandatory to wear in this hospital), we were told that there were no orthopedic doctors on staff until Monday.

Stop #2: Allegiant Regional Care (ARC) Hospital, Lapu-Lapu City.

This facility looked more modern than Mactan Doctors. Here, we asked for assistance. We were told to wait until 10:00am. For what, I'm not sure, but I think it was because that's when radiology opened. In the meantime, I headed up to the cafeteria and grabbed some food (a pretty tasty helping of pork, rice, and some veggies).

When 10:00am rolled around, we headed over to radiology, and the patient got a couple of x-rays taken. The broken collarbone was confirmed, but again, there were no doctors available on Saturday or Sunday at this place either.

Stop #3: Chung Hua Hospital in Mandaue City. 

After about a 45-minute drive, we arrived at Chung Hua. This place looked pretty modern, comparable to something you'd find in the US. By this time, it was after 12:00pm. We made our way to the information desk and were given a bunch of papers listing all of the doctors practicing at the hospital, their office locations (floor, office number), and their hours of availability. There were several doctors specializing in orthopedics at this facility; however, according to the paperwork we received, none of them were available after 12:00pm on Saturday. Since we were already in the building, we decided to head up to the respective floors and confirm for ourselves if any were still there—maybe we’d get lucky.

We rode the elevator up to the highest floor, searched for any office with a light on, and checked if the office was for an orthopedic doctor. Not a one. We made our way down to the next floor, rinsed and repeated, until we found one. In this office, we were told to go to another office on another floor, so we did. Here, we were told that the doctor had already left, but we could go just down the street to the Asian Clinic, a clinic that specializes in orthopedic medicine.

So, we headed back to the car and drove down the street a short distance, and found the place. It was open and had doctors on staff! Yeah!

Stop #4: Asian Clinic, Mandaue City

After some waiting, the patient was told that new x-rays were needed since the previous ones were not of the required quality. New, higher-quality x-rays were taken. The patient was given (bought) a small shoulder brace and was told by the doctor to keep ice on it, manage the pain, and come back in a week. The doctor wanted to see if the break would start to heal itself. If so, then no surgery would be needed. If not, surgery would be required to realign the two ends. Healing would take about 3 to 6 months with surgery, 6 to 8 weeks without.

It was now about 5:00pm, and we drove back to Lapu-Lapu. Four separate stops, 10 hours of traffic or waiting, two sets of x-rays in hand that clearly showed the broken bone, and a tentative path forward: wait and see.

Update: After a second visit to the Asian Clinic and new x-rays, the patient was given some good news. The patient was told that the bone looks like it is healing and no surgery would be needed, as long as the bone is allowed to heal without further injury.