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by Doc » Sat, 23 Oct 2010 12:03 pm
Just a follow-up to my earlier post.
First of all, thanks for all those who are concerned about us and about the domestic helper. I think I did not make myself clear first. I got her transferred from another family after she has been working for the other family for around a year. So we did not go through another round of health tests, naively assuming since she has been through all the tests, and she never left Singapore for the last year, she should be fine. So she actually developed the TB in Singapore.
When she was diagnosed as TB, she was still in the early stage. I guess that's why the hospital would not take her,. But our family was taking extra cautious to have her stay in one of our room only. Eventually after around 2-3 weeks of treatment, she was getting better and was no longer contagious. She requested going home to Myanmar when she was fine and the doctor in Singapore signed the release letter, which indicated that she was ok to take flights, etc. And we agreed.
That is part of the nightmare. Then our whole family were requested by the Singapore TB Control Unit to have TB tests, from skin tests, to x-ray, to culture, depending on each individual's situation. So far, after around three months after her diagnosis, here was what happened to my family:
1. my mother-in-law, my daughter, my husband and I were all cleared, we are fine;
2. My one-and-half year old son was found to have latent TB virus, and he is undertaking a 9-month medical treatment, which means he needs to take the medicine every day for the following 9-months! and the doctor is monitoring the process given the potential side effect of the medicine;
3. The case for my father-in-law is still unclear. They need to have his sample cultured, and it is not yet clear what is going on with him.
All-in-all, nobody is to blame. We just had a bad draw. Luckily, the maid returned home in good health condition, and she was thankful to my family to take care of her during those days. As to the medical bill, since she was not hospitalized, we took all the medical bill. As it is TB, the treatment after the diagnosis is free. But we did pay for out-of-pocket of over $1,000 medical bill before the diagnosis. Medical bill aside, it is the whole mess that the situation created.
We had a battle for a while whether we would go ahead to replace with another maid. Eventually we did. Thank god, after around 2-months of waiting time for the processing, our new maid is fine now.