One of the first things expats and family members over the age of 14 (I think?) go through upon their arrival in China – after quarantine ends – is the infamous medical check. This fairly comprehensive examination is a prerequisite for getting your residence permit. So, anyone who is on a work or spouse visa (which should be pretty much everyone able to enter China at this point) goes through it.
So far, I have only done this medical check in Shenyang, so I cannot vouch for other cities. But I would expect it to be similar in other places. To prepare you, my caterpillar and cocoon spouses, and anyone else who might find this of interest, I have decided to document my medical check experience this time around.
Overview
So, what can you expect at this ominous examination? In general, the whole process is set up like a well-oiled machine. You enter a special building where nothing but these types of medical checks are performed all day, every (working) day.
In Shenyang, the whole thing is set up on two floors, with an atrium in the middle.
In total, you meet medical professionals a total of 7 times. In turn, they will check your:
- vitals
- eyesight
- chest
- blood
- urine
- liver, kidneys, stomach
- heart
Each ‘examination’ is so quick that as a patient, you hardly know what’s what. This is why I don’t have any pictures or videos of the exams themselves.
Through my husband’s company, we were provided with a guide that took care of all the paperwork for us and kept shuffling us from one exam room to the next.
Let me try and recount our experiences there one by one.
Vitals – making sure we’re alive
In one room (not the first, as we kept bouncing around to whichever room had the least number of people waiting in line), we got to stick our arm in a stationary arm cuff. The cuff blew up, constricting around our biceps, and then took our blood pressure and pulse.
Next, we were asked to get on an electric scale that took in our height (with a laser) as well as our weight. I purposefully turned away from the screen, as I would rather be kept in the dark about my weight. But that’s just my preference…
Eyesight – behold the pirate spoon
To test our eyesight, we were pushed against a wall in yet another room, and what I call a pirate spoon was thrust in our hand. What is a pirate spoon, you ask? Well…sort of a pirate eye patch on a long metal stick, making the whole contraption look like an oversized ice cream spoon.
This thingamajig covers one eye, while the optometrist points at a row of letter Es with openings in various directions. Since I wear glasses and was asked to take them off before the exam, I got to look at some of the bigger rows on top. Because in the lower rows, all I saw were vague gray blobs. I still passed, though.
Chest – the quickest x-ray on record
For the chest examination, we were asked to step behind what looked like an armored metal door into the x-ray room. Oh, they had checked with me beforehand whether I was pregnant, so that was good. Anyway, in that room, I took off my top and bra, a one-time use papery top was thrust at me to put on, and the x-ray technician slapped a lead cuff around my neck and told me to hold up a weighted loincloth. She slipped out of the room, the machine started whirring, and then she motioned for me to put my clothes back on. All without a word, of course.
While I scrambled back into my clothes, my husband was already standing in the room, ready for his x-ray. I later found out that all the others simply stayed clothed, so I could have saved myself the hassle of un- and then redressing in such a hurry. Oh well, you live and learn, I guess.
I believe the chest x-ray is to check for tuberculosis. Though what would happen if you had that, I am not sure.
Blood samples – just like at the assembly line
The medical professional in charge of taking our blood was a consummate professional. You step into the room, give your documents, and roll up your sleeve while sitting down in front of something akin to a bank counter. As soon as your butt touches the seat and your arm is on the ‘counter’ the doctor has already bound your arm with a stretchy rubber tube, lightly slaps the crook of your arm, wipes it with some iodine, and sticks a butterfly needle in.
My blood vessels like to play hide-and-seek with the doctors, which often means I get two or even three stabs instead of one like other people. But the doctor at the medical check didn’t let that phase her and was done quicker than I could explain that I had difficult veins.
After getting a cotton swab to stop the blood flow after the sample, the next person was already up and I had to vacate my seat. Blood and urine samples were the only tests that had to come in this order – because the blood sampling room was where we were handed both a plastic collection cup and a small test tube labeled with our name and associated bar code. So, logically, the bathrooms were the next stop in our journey.
Urine samples – get ready for ‘the real China’
When it comes to giving a urine sample on your medical check, conditions are ‘interesting’. At least in Shenyang. Where new arrivals might only have experienced the bathrooms at the airport and their quarantine hotel, the Shenyang medical check toilets are ‘the real China’. They are squat toilets, and not for the faint of nose.
Therefore, a little dexterity is required when giving your urine sample – at least for the ladies. You need to hold the sample cup you’ve been given where you gave blood. You need to squat while trying to fill it. You need to make sure nothing else drops or droops into the toilet while you do this. You need to transfer the sample into the little test tube you were handed along with the cup. Ideally without spilling anything onto yourself or the precious label with your name and barcode on it on your test tube.
Would you be up for the challenge?
Liver, kidneys, stomach – brace yourself for some real talk
Another stop on our journey to getting the health check certificate for our residence permit was an ultrasound. That one and the ECG were in neighboring cubicles closed off with curtains. The line of people waiting their turn went up to the curtain, and one would have to stick one’s head in to check whether any other patient was still inside. Privacy? Not so much…
I knew the ultrasound technician from previous visits to the medical check center. A real tough Liaoning woman, she calls them like she sees them. My husband got treated to: “You have quite the fatty liver, don’t you? Eat less, exercise more. Next!” I, the next patient, got: “You’re not as fat as him. Still a bit of a fatty liver, but I’ll let it slide and put ‘normal’ on your form. Next!”
She was happy to discover I actually understood her and asked me how to say ‘fatty liver’ in English – apparently, we were not the only foreigners she had to use the term on. Ooookay then.
Heart – quick and painless ECG
Once our verdicts about fatty livers and the indicated solutions were over and done with, we got treated to an ECG. Quick and painless like all the other procedures, we were shuffled into the cubicle, asked to roll up our right pant leg and both sleeves. After barely laying down and being clipped with the cold braces, the technician let me know everything was normal and I could go. Easy as pie.
Fun extra activity: passport pictures, Chinese style
One last activity we had to run through before being done with our medical check was taking passport pictures. To apply for the residence permit, one needs two originals of the medical check report, with two pictures. Since we didn’t have pictures that were recent enough, we had ours taken on site.
The setup for taking the pictures is a pullout screen in a corner with a stool in front of it, and then, at quite some distance, a tripod with a digital camera situated right in front of the door to a small room. The photographer waits (im)patiently for the subject to sit down, click twice, then motion for you to get up again. After 5 minutes of mysterious rustling in the room, he hands over 6 passport pictures for a payment of 25 RMB (payable via WeChat Pay or Alipay, or – an increasing rarity in China – cash).
What is interesting is how the passport pictures looked when he was done with them. Have a look at mine…
White as a ghost, with a neck like a tree trunk (did he shrink my head somehow?), and devoid of most of my freckles. I am sure he meant well when applying this ‘light’ touch of photoshop to my pictures… Oh well, it’s only for the medical check report.
So, this is my account the last medical check for my latest residence permit. For those of you who have never done this – do you feel better prepared for it now?
And to those who have gone through this procedure already – was it very different for you?
Let me know in the comments or send me a message with your story.
