Routine check-up in Almaty: 12 doctors

We have been seeing Svetlana Igorevna since our daughter was born. She never prescribed an antibiotic where it could be avoided.

My son had been coughing for the third week. We started with the district polyclinic: they looked at his throat, said it was a "residual" cough, prescribed a syrup and sent us home. A week later the cough became nocturnal, the child stopped getting enough sleep, and by the evening he began to get short of breath when running. We booked an appointment with Svetlana Igorevna for the first available day. The appointment lasted almost forty minutes: she asked when exactly the cough starts, what we breathe at home, whether there are any animals, whether there had been any renovation, what the parents had been ill with in childhood. She listened to his lungs sitting and lying down, looked at his nose, and showed on her fingers how a bronchus works during a spasm. She said straight out that it did not look like a lingering URTI but like an airway reaction, and that this could be confirmed by spirometry — but the child is six years old, and he may not manage to blow out the sample on the first try, so we would go step by step. She gave a referral for spirometry and allergy tests, wrote out what to do during a night attack before the doctor arrives, and separately spelled out what not to do: not to swap the syrup for another syrup and not to start an antibiotic on our own. Two weeks later we came with the results, she went through the numbers aloud and explained which of them meant what. The cough was gone by the third week of the regimen. It is especially valuable that she never once talked to the child through us: she asked him directly and waited for an answer.

I came with an old problem that had been treated three times before. I was sent for an additional test the same day, and the result was discussed on the spot. I only regret that I did not come earlier.

I came with test results that I couldn't make sense of myself. They immediately found the cause that no one had mentioned before. I continue to be seen here.

I came with test results that I couldn't make sense of myself. They cancelled half of the previous prescriptions, explaining why they weren't needed. I'll continue my follow-up here.