With the weeks of recent sunshine, our thoughts naturally turn to summer holidays.
Each year throughout the summer months, my colleagues and I see patients who have developed illnesses on holiday which have caused much anxiety, destroyed everyone’s pleasure andoften been costly in terms of traveling home early and medical bills.
Many of these simple illnesses can often be avoided with a little planning beforehand and by simple preventative measures.The basic problems of sunburn, mosquito bites and traveler’s diarrhea are frequent enough to ruin a holiday and are usually easily avoided and treated.
Young people frolick in the Dnipro River on May 27. (AP)
Start slowly in the sun, using a good factor suntan cream for the first few days and take a long break over lunch to avoid the strong mid-day sun. It is particularly improtant to protect young children from the sun as they can become more seriously ill and dehydrated from sunburn. Get them to wear hats and spend a lot of time cooling in the sea.
Treat sunburn with a local anesthetic cream, keeping cool and drinking plenty of water, remember also to take a little salt and rest until you are comfortable. Sun exposure is implicated in the very serious skin cancer called melanoma and the risks are thought to be higher in those with pale skin and those with freckles who should take special care not to be overexposed.
In some seaside areas and near any water, mosquitoes can be a particular problem, especially in the evening. Use a good repellent and, if troublesome, wear long trousers and socks to minimize exposure. Smokers could be excused for smoking a strong French cigarette, but leaving one smoking in an ashtray also works well! High frequency emitters also work well. Take an antihistamine cream to sooth any bites and a simple antihistamine tablet, such as Clarityn, to stop the allergic reaction and itching. Occasionally itched bites get infected and do need a course of antibiotics. Keeping childrens’ nails clean helps minimize this risk.
Traveler’s diarrhea is again common, often caused by poor water or poor food preparation in busy resorts. Always use bottled water and be careful of food kiosks and cheap ice cream. Treat any symptoms of vomiting with motillum and diarrhea with smekta. Both are worth having in your travel bag. Rest and keep well-hydrated, giving children frequent small sips of rehydron fluid. When recovering, eat carbohydrates – bread, pasta, rice and potatoes for the first few days. Sea quality is a factor in gastrointestinal illness and has often been in question in Crimea.
While we should perhaps use holidays to restore our bodies, often we — especially when young — use holiday times to abuse our health and take risks.
Alcohol mixes badly with nearly all activities and most deaths in the sea are linked with its abuse, as are car and bike accidents and other injuries. Research shows that many people, indeed women more than men, also take sexual risks on holidays, unaware that holiday resorts are often high-risk areas for sexually transmitted diseases.
Sex education in Ukraine is neither universal nor very informative and Ukraine is a long way from, say, Holland where frank messages are given about the risk that people take on holiday. HIV is prevalent in holiday areas and, while doing project work south of Zaporizhia, I came across several HIV positive women who had contracted the disease while in Crimea.
Car hire is easy, but do remember to use a seat belt at all times and a helmet on motorbikes, both are clearly shown to reduce serious and often disfiguring injuries if you meet bad luck on a busy road. Once again resist the temptations of drinking and driving.
Always pack a simple bag of essential medicines, creams and bandages so you can manage minor illnesses yourself, without wasting the time and the expense of finding a doctor. Don’t forget travel sickness tablets if your children are prone to this problem. If going abroad always have some travel insurance and have the documentation on hand, I always keep it with a copy of our passports in a small medical bag. It is also useful to keep the telephone number of your physician in Ukraine and that of your nation’s consulate representative abroad who can help you with have serious problems.
Not everyone takes holidays by the sea, and Ukraine has some beautiful countryside in Transcarpathia and elsewhere. While many people spend holidays in forests and mountains, most are unaware of a serious illness called tick-borne encephalitis. Small ticks attach themselves to the skin burrowing in and infecting the blood with a small parasite that causes serious problems. Ticks are most common from April to October and my wife and I both recently got attacked after an enjoyable shashlik! They should be removed by suffocating them with any sort of gel which eventually makes them release their vice-like grip.
Occasional forest hikers should wear hats and long trousers and always have a rigorous whole body inspection! For frequent hikers, there is a vaccine (currently the only one available in Ukraine is manufactured in Russia) and three shots, over 6 to 12 months, give three-year immunity. If you are ill after being in a forest area do seek prompt advice and tell the doctor about this.
For those lucky enough to travel outside Europe, make sure to get good health insurance and check what it covers especially in terms of getting you back home if you are seriously ill, and whether your family can travel with you. Keep mobile and well hydrated on the flight and avoid too much alcohol. Taking aspirin for three days surrounding the flight reduces the risk of deep vein thrombosis.
Eat lightly on the plane and wear light clothing and take time to recover the next day after a long flight. In general, children seem to cope with travel as well as, if not better, than adults.
In tropical areas, talk to a physician before traveling to discuss immunizations and prevention of malaria and remember to take anti-malarial tablets when you return home as directed.
I wish you all happy and very healthy summer holidays.
Dr. Richard Styles is a British family physician at American Medical Centers, a full-service clinic, in Kyiv.
