health

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Although we are both health professionals and part of that job is to promote healthy lifestyle choices, if the truth be known we have probably not practiced what we preached. Human nature being what it is, all too easily we blame everything else but our own choices for putting on weight, loss of fitness, declining health etc. We, being humans, blamed our remote living for less availability of fresh food and less choices for our poor diet and extreme weather for not maintaining outdoor exercise.

Earlier this year we decided enough was enough and it was time to take extreme measures. Our extreme measures meant taking 2 months off work, flying to Kuala Lumpur, renting a lovely apartment complete with rooftop pool and gym and eating healthily!

While we started of with the best intentions, the lure of the amazing variety of cheap food available in KL was irresistible. To offset our "straying from the straight and narrow" we decided to undertake a complete health check and set out to research what was available. Long story short, we discovered HealthScan Malaysia's web site where you can select from an exhaustive menu of tests and investigations depending on your familial history, lifestyle risk factors or what you actually want!

We made a booking for Jo first to see how it all went and although we had an idea that the business was close to our accomodation it wasn't until we set out on the morning of the appointment to discover it was actually right across the road from where we were staying. The pricing of the package plus any of the optional tests isn't hugely cheaper than Australia. However if you added the cost of a GP consult first then if you could convince the GP that the tests were necessary then maybe the specialist appointment before actually having the test done, it is much cheaper. Not just the price factor, but in Australia you may have to wait weeks before being able to have the tests completed and then wait to get the results through another consult with your GP. Here we had them all done in one morning, in the one place, and had the results after having our supplied sandwiches and coffee.

Without going into our personal results, we are still walking around, our experience with the private healthcare facilities in KL were pretty good really. I ended up with an overnight stay in hospital and although perhaps the infection control practices weren't up to our standards the medical staff were certainly qualified and experienced. One thing we noticed that stood out from our Australian system is that specialists in Malaysia are as plentiful as GP's and to get an appointment with one you don't have to wait weeks and the cost in very minimal.

Although we used a private hospital we noted that we were usually the only tourist types about and even though the facility was aimed at local patronage the admin staff as well as medical staff were very pleasant and helpful. There is a definite system used in hospitals here but although it may seem unusual at first it works extremely well.

So really, by accident, we ended up participating in our own form of medical tourism and found it very rewarding and educational. We would recommend it to anyone of a more mature age that wanted to have some more control over their own health management. It can give you a better idea of where your body may be planning to let you down long before any signs or symptoms make themselves known and hopefully before it is too late to do anything about it.

We would recommend HealthScan Malaysia only because we had a good experience with them and not because of any financial reward or discount.

UPDATE- Since this was written we have had a second visit just to follow-up on any changes and all was well. The service has moved to another location near KL Central Station but the service and professional approach is still the same. This time we were able to make a short video about the facility which I will post on our Youtube channel soon. Let us know on the "our story" page contact form if you would like any more details.

See their website ........here

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health, and how to keep it.