Medical Care: General Tidbits

If you are looking for information about hospitals in Sana’a, please see: Medical Care: Hospitals in Sana’a for information about hospitals here.

 

Other medical related info/issues:

Understanding the doctor if you are a native English speaker.

I think most of the doctors you come across speak English. Sometimes however, with their accents, they can be hard to understand.

Prices

The prices are pretty reasonable here. At Modern German hospital, a pediatric check up costs about $3. A maternity delivery ranges from $50 - $100. I think we did an ultra sound there also for my stepson and it was like $10.00 or something.

Medicine

Medicine is reasonably priced. Medicine is not typically sold in stores. You may find a headache or stomach medicine at a little corner store, but most medicine is sold in the saydaleeyah (pharmacy). They sell just about everything here from headache medicines to heart medicines. In the hospitals that I have had experience with, if you are a patient in the hospital, you are required to buy your own medicine. When my stepson was in the hospital we had to take the prescription to a pharmacy. Hospitals have their own pharmacies, but we have had to go to an outside pharmacy to get a prescription or two filled because the hospital was out of them.

 

Over the Counter Meds

 

Below are a few of the generic brands of products that we have purchased for various common minor ailments, in case you are just arriving in Sana’a and need to buy something for a cold, etc. It may be handy to know the names of some things as sometimes it can be difficult to get the pharmacist to understand what you need. Many pharmacists speak some English, but some don’t.

Many of the products are either made in Egypt, Yemen, the UAE, etc though you will find some from places like Germany or the UK.

• Amol (fever reducer, pain reliever) for kids
• Ramol, similar name, same thing, for kids
• Flukit, for cold symptoms
• Calamyl, calamine lotion, kind of on the runny side
• Dermovate, really strong for eczema
• Soolan, cough syrup.
• Actifed, cough/cold
• Laxolac, laxative
• Disflatyl, gas and discomfort

I really haven’t seen a good stomach medicine here. They always give us the same thing, Scopinal, and I don’t really like that. I have been looking for a pepto bismol/milk of magnesia/tums type medicine and have yet to see it, so if you use those, I suggest bringing those to start you off.

 

Is-haal (diarrhea) is really common for foreigners so you might want to bring a medicine for that when you come to start you off. You might get it from eating foods from the smaller street vendors and restaurants or drinking water from the tap (which I don’t recommend unless you have no choice).

Vitamins are called “fie-ta-menaat” Most stores have a syrup (shurab) for children (atfaal), although I have found the chewables at one pharmacy so far. I really don’t think they as good as US brands though, Allahu ilm.

Hope this gives you a clearer picture of some things you might expect if you are planning on coming.