uninsured in need of treatment

May 30, 2005 8:50 AM

If I am currently uninsured and have all the symptoms of strep throat, what is my best option for free or cheap treatment? If it isn't strep it is an infection of some kind. It seems like overkill to walk into an emergency room for this but I need antibiotics. What should I do/where should I go?
posted by Grod to Health & Fitness (28 answers total)

Where are you?
posted by mischief at 8:56 AM on May 30, 2005

Response by poster: Baltimore, MD specifically Charles Villiage
posted by Grod at 8:56 AM on May 30, 2005

Will the Shepherd's Clinic help you out?

Here is an article about a men's health clinic the city runs.
posted by cmonkey at 9:09 AM on May 30, 2005

If it's strep, you will probably need antibiotics, but you may want to try gargling with salt water. That often works for me. (Hint: have a glass of regular water handy; salt water is nasty stuff to gargle.)
posted by Doohickie at 9:20 AM on May 30, 2005

all the symptoms of strep throat
i thought the only way to tell was with a test, and that most sore throats were not strep throat.
posted by andrew cooke at 9:23 AM on May 30, 2005

Response by poster: I never used to get sick. Until I moved into this apartment in mid march. Since then I've had mono and two different throat infections. Looks like this is illness #4. I'm starting to wonder if the building is cursed.

andrew it may or may not be strep, the pain, fever, and nasty offwhite crud coating my tonsils suggests it is something.
posted by Grod at 9:25 AM on May 30, 2005

Before my tonsilectomy, I used to get strep really bad, with 104F+ fever. So yeah, it can be kinda serious. There are some good, cheap antibiotics out there, FWIW.
posted by LordSludge at 9:26 AM on May 30, 2005

Here in the Twin Cities there are "Docs in a Box" at various Target and grocery stores. You can go for a diagnosis and treatment of common ailments (strep, flu, topical rash, ear infection, etc) or basic flu shots and inoculations. It's typically about $45 a visit, and you meet with an RN. It's faster than a free clinic, and you don't have to worry about a sliding scale for payment or the hassle of an appointment at a busy clinic. They're very professional--highly recommended.

Looks like they just opened a chain of 13 in Baltimore. Get well soon!
posted by hamster at 9:32 AM on May 30, 2005

fwiw, moving is one of the most stressful things we do (apparently - something to do with new territories and primaeval instincts, perhaps), so it may be the moving itself, rather than the building. good luck.
posted by andrew cooke at 9:34 AM on May 30, 2005

A visit to a family doctor goes for about $40-45 around these parts (central PA). Antibiotics are pretty cheap... $10-15-ish. Is that too much to pay out of pocket?

Last time I drove through Baltimore (several months ago), I came back to PA on York Road, and there was a Target in Timonium that had a sign up for a clinic that could be the one hamster is describing. You might want to call that location's pharmacy (at [phone]) and see if you can get more details.
posted by MegoSteve at 9:45 AM on May 30, 2005

Back in college my girlfriend and I came down with a similar throat "infection" at the same time and were worried we may have caught something. It turned out to be the dry air in her apartment from the type of heater she had that was causing the glands in our throats to swell and mimicking systems of an actual infection. This has happened to me a few times since. With the new apartment, this could be the case for you. Get checked out, but if it turns out not to be a serious infection, try drinking a lot of water and possibly getting a humidifier for your apartment. The "Drink plenty of fluids" advice is always good anyway.
posted by Yorrick at 9:50 AM on May 30, 2005

For emergency self treatment,without a prescription, a wide range of antibiotics are available at pet stores, for treating aquariums.
posted by hortense at 10:24 AM on May 30, 2005

Try Oil of Oregano. Nasty-tasting, but I'm pretty sure it helped me fight off the cold I had a couple weeks ago.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:27 AM on May 30, 2005

The ventillation in your building could be bad (see), you could ask your fellow residents if they've noticed something similar.
posted by abcde at 10:29 AM on May 30, 2005

there are "Docs in a Box".....They're very professional--highly recommended.

Doc in the box places are highly varied. Some very good, some quite awful. Better than nothing, a last resort, but be careful. (I worked in the med field where we would often get 'doc in the box' survivors).
posted by justgary at 10:32 AM on May 30, 2005

One thing, when you do find a sympathetic doctor, ask for an extra prescription. If they know you don't have insurance, they're likely to want to help, even if they would make someone with insurance come see them again. Or ask if you can call in the future, instead of coming in. This strategy is more likely to be successful if you go to a doctor with her own small practice, as opposed to a group. It may be worth it to pay for a doctor who doesn't take insurance, as that leads to more personal service and can cost less in the long run.

Also, are you sure you don't know anyone who has a parent who's a doctor? That's where I get my prescriptions.
posted by dame at 10:37 AM on May 30, 2005

For emergency self treatment,without a prescription, a wide range of antibiotics are available at pet stores, for treating aquariums.
posted by hortense at 10:24 AM PST on May 30 [!]

There are also antibiotics available at farm supply stores for livestock, with helpful dose guides on the back (a several oz. bag of tetracycline is a couple bucks). However, make sure you actually have a bacterial infection so that you are not adding to the strains of resistant bacteria. I think for strep, you should see white patches in your throat or red patches on your skin (scarlet fever). I also believe that highly colored snot (green or brown) is a sign. I am not an MD, and every thing I have related here is the result of an impression that I have, not the result of actual research.
posted by 445supermag at 10:51 AM on May 30, 2005

Do you have any bartender friends? Sounds funny, but shortly after I first moved back to Chicago, I had no job, no insurance, and a bad case of strep. One of my best friends is a bartender, and hooked me up with the "bartender" doctor, who was a neighborhood doc that understood that most of his patients didn't have insurance, so he'd hook them up with samples, in my case enough for a full course of antibiotics, instead of giving prescriptions. The office visit ran me about 50 bucks.
posted by monkey!knife!fight! at 11:00 AM on May 30, 2005

If you get antibiotics, DO A FULL COURSE.

If you don't you'll not only end up sicker than you are now, but you'll likely end up creating a new, harder to kill infection to screw others over even worse with. :-S

If you can't afford a full course, don't bother. If you don't do ALL the anti-biotics you're wasting your money, time, and worsening your health.
posted by shepd at 12:00 PM on May 30, 2005

Whoa whoa whoa here--andrew cooke is right; you have the symptoms of a sore throat, which may or may not be strep. If it *is* strep, you need to get antibiotics. For a diagnosis, you need a strep test.

You need antibiotics because there's a risk of post-strep consequences: post-strep glomerulonephritis and post-strep rheumatic heart disease.
posted by gramcracker at 12:43 PM on May 30, 2005

There are also antibiotics available at farm supply stores for livestock, with helpful dose guides on the back (a several oz. bag of tetracycline is a couple bucks).

U. F. B.

You need antibiotics because there's a risk of post-strep consequences: post-strep glomerulonephritis and post-strep rheumatic heart disease.


Exactly.
posted by docpops at 4:14 PM on May 30, 2005

You need antibiotics because there's a risk of post-strep consequences: post-strep glomerulonephritis and post-strep rheumatic heart disease.


Exactly.

NOT exactly. The risk of developing post-strep glomerulonephritis and the severity of an episode should it occur will not be affected by taking the appropriate antibiotics.

Still, the risk of rheumatic disease is real (though small), and preventable with the meds. So yes, based on your albeit incomplete story, this still does warrant seeing a doctor and getting treatment.
posted by drpynchon at 4:29 PM on May 30, 2005

People survived strep without antibiotics long before these wonder drugs were invented. I like to take a holistic approach to such infections and avoid the pills when I can. Whether this is better for me or not who knows, but I tend not to be a generator of antibiotic resistant bugs. After a three or four days with pain and fever though, get help. Your symptoms sound like strep. Do you have foul breath and a tongue that looks like a strawberry also? These are common signs as well, but of course it can be strep without them. If you are really feeling miserable, don't be a cheap ass and hurt yourself. A medicenter and prescription will be less than a hundred dollars and your health is worth that, no? If you don't have the hundred (how are you on the internets in that case?) then go to the emergency room. Whatever you do do not take someone else's left over meds, (unless they have a full ten day course, but you do that at your own risk, at least you are then less likely to leave the rest of us with a resistant strain).
posted by caddis at 5:57 PM on May 30, 2005

I find it quite unnerving that there are serious suggestions of heading to the pet store or livestock feed store for meds. If such isn't a sign of big problems in a healthcare system, I can't imagine what would be.
posted by five fresh fish at 6:28 PM on May 30, 2005

which healthcare system, fff? I don't know of many (any?) that will give you free antibiotic unless you're lying on a bed in a hospital...
posted by shepd at 7:38 PM on May 30, 2005

Hey, I'm from Charles Village as well, and (perhaps not coincidentally) came down with all the symptoms of strep about a week ago. GO TO THE TARGET MINUTECLINIC!
It will cost approx. $45 without insurance, and will take roughly 20 minutes. I went to the one in White Marsh, which definitely offers this service.
They do a 5 minute strep test right in front of you and then send a throat culture off to a lab that calls you the next day if you do indeed have strep. I was negative, fwiw.
posted by celibate_life at 7:44 PM on May 30, 2005

Who said anything about free pills, shepd?
posted by five fresh fish at 8:07 AM on May 31, 2005

That said, I'd be hard-pressed to believe for an instant that in Canada, someone who is truly down-and-out couldn't easily get free medication.
posted by five fresh fish at 8:07 AM on May 31, 2005