Pattaya - Where's best for a suspected kidney/bladder infection urine test?

[scubascuba3]

I was looking for this last week, don't think I have one now but where is best to go?

 

Don't say BPH, I'm not looking for the most expensive, just a good value place that does the job.

 

Labs don't seem to do it, they seemed to want to send me for a kidney function test to sell something, but isn't the correct tests (lesson there, ensure you know what you need when going to a lab).

 

PS I'm not looking for gonorrhea or Chlamydia tests, they can be done at labs

 

 

Edited October 23, 2023 by scubascuba3

[simon43]

I always use Lifecare Labs for blood and urine tests (infections, PSA etc)

[Will B Good]

70% of infections are Ecoli......buy three sachets of MONUROL....it is a wonder drug and tastes very nice.

[cjinchiangrai]

Any public hospital for a few hundred baht. 

[scubascuba3]

34 minutes ago, simon43 said:

I always use Lifecare Labs for blood and urine tests (infections, PSA etc)

Lifecare doesn't do bladder/kidney urine infection tests

[Sheryl]

The issue is not where but what test.

 

What you actually need, if you have symptoms suggestive of a urinary tract infection, is a urine culture and (if positive) sensitivity. All hospitals and some major labs in Bangkok can do this  - it is  not listed on the webpage of Lifecare or CCs Labs.

 

Many doctors will try to skip that and just provide antibiotics (shot gun approach) first. Which can make it subsequently difficult to identify the causative organism and suitable antibiotic if the initial treatment fails.

 

Note that even with urine culture, prostate infections may be missed. Semen culture is better but good luck persuading a Thai doctor to order this.  Ideally, should get both urine and semen culture and, if then sensitivity if  either are positive. These are never part of check up packages you'd have to see a urologist first and have him order them.

 

you might try calling Dr. Olivier Clinic  but make sure to specify:

 

urine culture and sensitivity

semen culture and sensitivity (NOT sperm count which is usual semen test).

 

I doubt they do this onsite but they can probably send it out to a hospital lab and you may do better in getting Dr. Olivier to order this than you would with a Thai doctor.

 

Highly unlikely you have a kidney infection as if you did, you'd be severely ill (high fever etc). But bladder or prostate infection possible especially if you have an enlarged prostate.

[scubascuba3]

28 minutes ago, Will B Good said:

70% of infections are Ecoli......buy three sachets of MONUROL....it is a wonder drug and tastes very nice.

From Fascino? Standard size sachet I presume?

[scubascuba3]

28 minutes ago, cjinchiangrai said:

Any public hospital for a few hundred baht. 

Don't they force you to see a doctor first for 500+?

[scubascuba3]

9 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

The issue is not where but what test.

 

What you actually need, if you have symptoms suggestive of a urinary tract infection, is a urine culture and (if positive) sensitivity. All hospitals and some major labs in Bangkok can do this  - it is  not listed on the webpage of Lifecare or CCs Labs.

 

Many doctors will try to skip that and just provide antibiotics (shot gun approach) first. Which can make it subsequently difficult to identify the causative organism and suitable antibiotic if the initial treatment fails.

 

Note that even with urine culture, prostate infections may be missed. Semen culture is better but good luck persuading a Thai doctor to order this.  Ideally, should get both urine and semen culture and, if then sensitivity if  either are positive. These are never part of check up packages you'd have to see a urologist first and have him order them.

 

you might try calling Dr. Olivier Clinic  but make sure to specify:

 

urine culture and sensitivity

semen culture and sensitivity (NOT sperm count which is usual semen test).

 

I doubt they do this onsite but they can probably send it out to a hospital lab and you may do better in getting Dr. Olivier to order this than you would with a Thai doctor.

 

Highly unlikely you have a kidney infection as if you did, you'd be severely ill (high fever etc). But bladder or prostate infection possible especially if you have an enlarged prostate.

My symptom which are intermittent is back ache/pain, which I never associated with an infection until a couple weeks ago, took Ceftriaxione and Doxycycline to treat possible MG/Gonorrhea and my back ache/pain disappeared straight away, 2nd time that's happened so must be a link. Is confusing because I usually have back pain anyway but this felt different 

[Sheryl]

5 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

My symptom which are intermittent is back ache/pain, which I never associated with an infection until a couple weeks ago, took Ceftriaxione and Doxycycline to treat possible MG/Gonorrhea and my back ache/pain disappeared straight away, 2nd time that's happened so must be a link. Is confusing because I usually have back pain anyway but this felt different 

Infection confined to bladder or prostate will not cause/explain  back pain.

 

Back pain does occur in kidney infections but these are severe illness accompanied by high fever and often vomiting.

 

Occasionally a kidney cyst will cause back pain. test for infection won't determine if you have a kidney cyst, and most kidney cysts do not warrant treatment.

 

The back pain stopping twice when taking antibiotics  is almost certainly coincidence not causation.

 

The intensity and type of back pain often changes. If I were you I would drop this line of inquery and see a good physiotherapist re your back.

 

 

[KhunBENQ]

56 minutes ago, Will B Good said:

70% of infections are Ecoli.

Yes. Escherichia coli was it for me after TURP. The urine cultures showed a long list of antibiotics for which these bacteria are resistant. During inpatient I got a bloody expensive infusion 3500 per day ("Invanz").

Later developing another infection . Urine foggy and stinking. Got oral antibiotics again very expensive: "Gracevit".

28 pills. 4 per day for 6000 a week!

Now found at medisafe online, 1350 Baht for 10.

 

Just to give you an idea.

 

Never had severe pain,  no back pain.

Discomfort when peeing sometimes 

Edited October 23, 2023 by KhunBENQ

[Will B Good]

28 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

From Fascino? Standard size sachet I presume?

Packets I had were about 3"x3".......after being tears for weeks this worked within 48 hours....

[scubascuba3]

Just now, Will B Good said:

Packets I had were about 3"x3".......after being tears for weeks this worked within 48 hours....

What were your symptoms?

[Will B Good]

4 minutes ago, KhunBENQ said:

Yes. Escherichia coli was it for me after TURP. The urine cultures showed a long list of antibiotics for which these bacteria are resistant. During inpatient I got a bloody expensive infusion 3500 per day ("Invanz").

Later developing another infection . Urine foggy and stinking. Got oral antibiotics again very expensive: "Gracevit".

28 pills. 4 per day for 6000 a week!

Now found at medisafe online, 1350 Baht for 10.

 

Just to give you an idea.

 

Never had severe pain,  no back pain.

Discomfort when peeing sometimes 

I had been in constant low-level, very exhausting pain for about two months.....Monurol sorted me out in 48 hours.....boom.

[Will B Good]

9 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

What were your symptoms?

Constant low level pain, 24/7......... no relief from it whatsoever deep inside in the bladder area.......it did drive me to tears.

 

The hospital conned me....they treated me for weeks with antibiotics that they knew were totally ineffective against what was most likely to be Ecoli.

Edited October 23, 2023 by Will B Good

[scubascuba3]

6 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

Infection confined to bladder or prostate will not cause/explain  back pain.

 

Back pain does occur in kidney infections but these are severe illness accompanied by high fever and often vomiting.

 

Occasionally a kidney cyst will cause back pain. test for infection won't determine if you have a kidney cyst, and most kidney cysts do not warrant treatment.

 

The back pain stopping twice when taking antibiotics  is almost certainly coincidence not causation.

 

The intensity and type of back pain often changes. If I were you I would drop this line of inquery and see a good physiotherapist re your back.

 

 

I have a couple herniated discs and degenerative disc disease, diagnosed about 23 years ago so I kinda live with it most of the time, stretches can help, sometimes. I understand what's going on so don't bother with a physio

[tgw]

1 hour ago, simon43 said:

I always use Lifecare Labs for blood and urine tests (infections, PSA etc)

 

yes.

no need to go to a hospital to carry out simple blood/urine tests.

[scubascuba3]

49 minutes ago, tgw said:

 

yes.

no need to go to a hospital to carry out simple blood/urine tests.

Depends on the tests it seems, I tried 3 labs, no have

[tgw]

6 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

Depends on the tests it seems, I tried 3 labs, no have

 

what ?

the labs don't have tests to detect bacteria in urine ?

[simon43]

2 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

Lifecare doesn't do bladder/kidney urine infection tests

Oh dear, so I wonder what they were doing when they gave me a bladder/kidney urine infection test last year.....

[Sheryl]

2 hours ago, tgw said:

 

yes.

no need to go to a hospital to carry out simple blood/urine tests.

Culture and sensitivity is not a simple test. Many labs cannot do it.

[scubascuba3]

1 hour ago, tgw said:

 

what ?

the labs don't have tests to detect bacteria in urine ?

Bladder or kidney infection tested via urine no have. You can see it on a labs list?

[Sheryl]

34 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Oh dear, so I wonder what they were doing when they gave me a bladder/kidney urine infection test last year.....

What type of test exactly did they do? As urine culture is definitely not on their webpage list.

 

I suspect maybe a simple dipstick test for nitrates? (which for UTI in a man, not what is needed).

[scubascuba3]

36 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Oh dear, so I wonder what they were doing when they gave me a bladder/kidney urine infection test last year.....

Can you see it on their list?

[Sheryl]

1 hour ago, tgw said:

 

what ?

the labs don't have tests to detect bacteria in urine ?

Any lab can do a simple dipstick test for nitrates. But sensitivity is quite low. In no way as accurate as a culture, and cultures require special facilities. Many commercial labs do not do this.

 

Many labs (but not all) can also do a microscopic examination of urine for the presence of white blood cells.  This too has very low sensitivity (<50%).

 

One needs to look very criticall at what a "urinalysis", at either a lab or a hospital, actually concssts of. A lot of places are doing a simple dipstick test.

 

 

 

 

[tgw]

37 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

Any lab can do a simple dipstick test for nitrates. But sensitivity is quite low. In no way as accurate as a culture, and cultures require special facilities. Many commercial labs do not do this.

 

Many labs (but not all) can also do a microscopic examination of urine for the presence of white blood cells.  This too has very low sensitivity (<50%).

 

One needs to look very criticall at what a "urinalysis", at either a lab or a hospital, actually concssts of. A lot of places are doing a simple dipstick test.

 

 

I would expect labs to be able to send the sample for a culture.

[sandyf]

18 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

Don't they force you to see a doctor first for 500+?

Not normally at government hospital. I use Bang Saen most of the time and that is 100 baht for consultation, cost me that to see the plastic surgeon last week.

I have heard the Pattaya City hospital is not very falang friendly so maybe they overcharge but the one at Naklua is said to be reasonable.

[JimTripper]

i had this awhile back and knocked it out in about a week without antibiotics by drinking large amounts of juices, water, cranberry juice, lemon water, citric acid type fruit, etc. drinking all day. pissed it out basically.

 

i was in the usa where juices are much cheaper though and i was in a hot climate where it was easy to drink liquids.

 

the frequent urination went away so that's how i knew i got rid of it and it was not getting worse.

 

i also drank these "live probiotic" drinks that get pro bacteria in there to eat bad bacteria, which i could "feel working". would likely be expensive to buy in thailand so don't know if it's worth it here.

 

my only symptom was frequent urination. uti was noticed by lab tests during a routine physical.

Edited October 24, 2023 by JimTripper

[scubascuba3]

4 hours ago, sandyf said:

Not normally at government hospital. I use Bang Saen most of the time and that is 100 baht for consultation, cost me that to see the plastic surgeon last week.

I have heard the Pattaya City hospital is not very falang friendly so maybe they overcharge but the one at Naklua is said to be reasonable.

Last time I went to Pattaya City Hall a few years ago it was 500, I reckon Bang Lamung may well be the 100 you refer to, not tried it yet

[sandyf]

3 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

Last time I went to Pattaya City Hall a few years ago it was 500, I reckon Bang Lamung may well be the 100 you refer to, not tried it yet

I take it you mean Pattaya City hospital,not Hall, the one I said I heard was unreasonable. 

I said I use Bang Saen, not Banglumung, that's Naklua and I live Chonburi, cheap there but I wouldn't recommend it.

For a couple of years I was seeing a dermatologist and cardiologist and the they arranged the appointments for the same day so I only paid the 100 baht to see both doctors. It is made up of 2 x 50 baht, one for admin and one for nursing staff, the doctors come free.

Unless you go to Pattaya City.