Pre-Flight Medical Check in Phuket
Long-haul flights punish anybody who boards already unwell, and the aircraft is a bad place to discover it. A pre-flight medical check in Phuket is a short, focused assessment before you go: is this safe, does anything need treating first, and is there a document you should be carrying.
Who benefits from one
Not everybody needs this. The people who do tend to fall into recognisable groups.
- Anyone who has been ill during the trip and is not fully recovered
- People with a chest infection, a cold, or a blocked ear
- Anyone recently treated for an injury or who has had a procedure here
- Travellers with heart or lung conditions facing thirteen hours in a seat
- Anyone in a plaster cast
- Late pregnancy, where the airline wants a letter anyway
- Divers whose last dive was closer to the flight than it should have been
Everyone else is fine and should go and enjoy the last day.
What is actually checked
Oxygen saturation, blood pressure, pulse, temperature, and a look at the chest and the ears — because those are the systems a pressurised cabin actually stresses.
The current state of any illness or injury from the trip, and whether it is heading in the right direction or the wrong one.
Your medication, and whether you have enough to get home with a delay factored in — see prescription refills.
Ears and sinuses, the single most common problem
A blocked eustachian tube and a descending aircraft produce severe pain and occasionally a perforated eardrum. This is by a wide margin the thing that ruins flights home.
Days in a pool, a head cold picked up in the last week, or an untreated ear infection all set it up.
Decongestants started the day before, a spray used correctly on descent, and treatment of anything infected. All of it works far better begun in advance than at thirty thousand feet — see swimmers ear treatment.
Stomach trouble in the last few days
Boarding a fourteen-hour flight with unresolved gastroenteritis is genuinely awful and occasionally dangerous, because dehydration and a long seated journey are a poor combination.
Fluid balance is assessed, and where somebody is behind, that is corrected before departure rather than during the flight — see IV drips.
Anti-emetics and anti-motility medication have their place for a flight, prescribed with a clear explanation of when not to take them.
Clots, and the advice worth taking
Long flights raise the risk of deep vein thrombosis modestly for most people and rather more for some — recent surgery, a leg injury, a cast, pregnancy, or a previous clot.
Move hourly, drink water rather than alcohol, and consider compression stockings, which do more than most of the advice given about this.
Where the risk is genuinely raised, preventive medication is discussed rather than assumed, and a leg that is already swollen, hot and painful needs assessing before you fly at all.
Flying after an injury from the trip
A cast needs about forty-eight hours between application and take-off, because air trapped beneath it expands as the cabin climbs.
Fresh wounds and burns need dressings that will last the journey, plus enough materials to change them on arrival — see wound care.
Stitches due out mid-journey are better removed early where the wound allows it, or the date and instructions written down for whoever does it at home.
Divers and the interval that is not negotiable
Flying too soon after diving causes decompression illness in people who did everything correctly underwater, because the cabin altitude does what a rapid ascent would.
A single no-decompression dive needs at least twelve hours before flying. Repetitive or multi-day diving needs eighteen or more.
Anyone with symptoms after a dive — joint pain, tingling, unusual fatigue, a rash — needs assessing before going anywhere near an airport — see ear barotrauma treatment.
The documents you may need
Airlines ask for medical clearance in specific circumstances, and asking at the desk is worse than arriving with it — see fit to fly certificates.
A letter listing medication is worth having for borders that take an interest in what is in your bag.
Where the honest conclusion is that you should not fly yet, that document exists too, and it is what a policy needs to fund the change — see travel insurance claims.
Doing it at your accommodation
On the last morning nobody wants to add a journey across the island to the schedule. A doctor coming to you fits between packing and the transfer — see doctor hotel visits.
Assessment, treatment, prescriptions and paperwork, all in your room.
Bang Tao, Kata and Patong are open at any hour too, which matters when the flight is at seven in the morning.
Timing and cost
A day or two before departure is ideal. That leaves room to treat an ear, correct dehydration, or organise a document without a scramble.
The morning of the flight is still worth doing and is far better than boarding and hoping.
Priced as a consultation with anything additional quoted separately, and everything documented for an insurer as a matter of course.
One thing worth deciding before you ask: what you want to happen if the answer is unwelcome. Some people want clearance and some want permission to stay another week, and a doctor cannot supply either on request. What you get is an honest assessment and the paperwork that matches it, whichever direction that goes.
Frequently asked questions
When should I have this done?
A day or two before departure. That leaves time to treat an ear or organise paperwork without a rush.
Can I fly with a cold?
Usually, but a blocked ear on descent is painful and can perforate an eardrum. Treatment started a day early makes a large difference.
How long after diving can I fly?
At least twelve hours after a single no-decompression dive and eighteen or more after repetitive or multi-day diving.
I have been vomiting all week.
Get assessed. Dehydration plus a long seated flight is a poor combination, and it is easily corrected before you board.
Should I worry about blood clots?
Modestly for most people, more after surgery, injury, a cast or pregnancy. Move hourly, drink water, and consider compression stockings.
I have a new plaster cast.
Most airlines want forty-eight hours between application and the flight, because air under the cast expands as the cabin climbs.
What if my stitches are due out mid-journey?
They can often come out early where the wound allows it. Otherwise you leave with the date and written instructions in English.
Can somebody come to the hotel on the last morning?
Yes — assessment, treatment, prescriptions and documents, all in your room, at whatever hour the flight demands.
Three clinics, none of which close
English-speaking doctors, on duty 24 hours a day. Phuket is bigger than visitors expect and the traffic is worse than the map suggests, so Takecare Medical Clinic works from three separate buildings rather than one: Bang Tao on the north-west coast, Kata in the south, and Patong between them. Each is open every hour of every day, takes people without an appointment, and asks nothing about residency or referrals.
Beyond the island, Takecare Medical Clinic is one of the Takecare Clinic group‘s clinics working across Phuket, Krabi and Chon Buri. That matters mainly for what happens afterwards: move on mid-treatment and the next clinic already holds the notes, so a handover is a call between colleagues rather than a folder you carry through an airport.
Getting seen, and how to choose a branch
There is somebody on the end of +66 81 718 9080 or WhatsApp 24 hours, every day. Say what has gone wrong and the reply will be honest about which of three things you are dealing with: come in now, this will keep until the morning, or skip us entirely and go where there is a surgeon. No appointment exists to be made, and there is no hour at which asking is a nuisance.
Pick whichever branch is nearest rather than whichever sounds largest — they run the same hours and carry the same equipment. Patong suits the west-coast beaches and Bangla Road, Kata covers Karon and the south, and Bang Tao serves Layan, Surin and Cherngtalay. Cannot get out to a clinic? Ask for a doctor hotel visit instead and somebody comes to your room. And if what you need turns out to be beyond any clinic, referral and hospital transfer is arranged from the same conversation. You are made stable before anybody moves you, a colleague rings ahead so the team on the other end knows what is arriving, and the transport is organised for you rather than handed over as one more thing to sort out.