NEWS & DEVELOPMENTS

Babies develop fewer antibodies against pertussis (whooping cough) if the mother is given the pertussis vaccine before the 24th week of pregnancy. These findings are from a multi-year study carried out by RIVM among preterm and full-term babies and their mothers. The results show that transfer of antibodies from mother to child is less efficient before the 24th week compared to later in pregnancy. There are no indications that protection against pertussis is insufficient if the vaccine is given earlier, at around 22 weeks.

Subject: Telephone Lines

Dear patients,

We are glad to inform you that our telephone lines are back to normal hours.

Our telephone accessibility will be as follows:

• For general inquiries and non-life-threatening medical concerns, we will be available from 08:00 to 11:00 AM and from 11:30 to 16:00 PM (select option 3 in the menu for the general practitioner).
• For life-threatening medical concerns, we will be available from 08:00 to 17:00 PM (select option 1 in the menu for the general practitioner).

We highly appreciate your understanding and cooperation during the period that we implemented a half day opening of our telephone lines. To streamline our services, all administrative queries, such as requesting laboratory results, canceling appointments, address changes, etc., be submitted via email. For prescription refills, an online option is available on our website.

Pilot Program and Future Appointments via the Website

As part of our ongoing efforts to improve our services, we are also exploring the possibility of scheduling future appointments online through our website. We will keep you informed of further developments in this regard.

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us. We appreciate your understanding and cooperation as we strive to enhance your healthcare experience.

Best regards,

International Health Centre the Hague

The Netherlands is currently experiencing an influenza (flu) epidemic. There is a great increase in the number of people suffering with flu-like symptoms, that are identified as influenza. Flu-like symptoms can also be due to Covid-19, RS-virus or rhinovirus.

Symptoms can include a runny nose, sore throat, dry cough, cold chills, muscle acles, tiredness and a fever up to 39 C or higher.

How to reduce your risk of getting upper respiratory infections:

The advice is the same as with Covid-19; wash or sanitize your hands frequently, maintain social distancing, cough or sneeze in your elbow or tissue, and isolate from others if you develop symptoms. This is particularly important to avoid passing on the virus to vulnerable people such as babies and children, older people and those that are immune compromised.

If you develop symptoms:

• Isolate from others as much as possible
• Do a self-test to check whether the symptoms are due to Covid-19
• Drink enough fluids to stay hydrated
• Take paracetamol if you are suffering with symptoms
• Rest and take it easy, but get out of bed a few times a day at least for a short walk around the house
• Don’t exercise if you have a fever. Take 1-3 days rest after your fever is gone.

It may be that you feel quite unwell and need to stay in bed for a few days. It may also be that you don’t suffer too many symptoms. Usually, the fever improves within 3-5 days. It can take 1-3 weeks before you feel fully recovered. Some people do become worse and develop a lung infection or need to be admitted to hospital.

Contact your GP or the out-of-hours GP service if you have the flu and notice one or more of the following:

• You are getting increasingly sicker
• You become short of breath or have increasing difficulty breathing
• You fainted
• You have chest pain
• You have become drowsy or confused

Call your doctor if you have the flu and 1 or more of these apply to you:

• You drink very little or urinate very little
• You developed a fever again after you have had no fever for a few days
• You have low immunity due to an illness or medicines such as chemotherapy
• You have a serious disease of your heart and blood vessels
• You have a serious lung disease such as severe asthma or severe COPD
• You have kidney disease that makes your kidneys work less well
• You have a liver disease that causes your liver to work poorly

The assistant will first ask you questions about how bad your complaints are. If necessary, the doctor will examine you.

For more information visit thuisarts.nl (in Dutch) or the RIVM website 

Kind regards,

International Health Centre the Hague

Dear Patients,

The IHCH will be closed on Monday 26th December. All other days (except weekends) we are open.

Please note that the phone lines for the dental clinic will close at 16:00 (instead of 17:00) from Friday 23rd December until Friday 30th December. On Monday 2nd January 2023 the phone lines will resume usual opening times. For out-of-hours dental emergencies contact Dental 365. 

The GP practice, Polyclinic and Pharmacy phone lines remain unchanged throughout this period.

We thank you for your understanding and cooperation, and wish you all a wonderful and healthy festive period.

Kind regards,

International Health Centre the Hague

Dear Patients,

The Polyclinic telephone lines will now close at 16:00 pm.  This means you can call us anytime between 08:00 am and 16:00 pm, Monday through Friday. Our emergency line remains open throughout the day from 08:00-17:00.

To cancel appointments and for administrative requests you can email us at  ihchpoli@ezorg.nl. This includes requesting medical results, cancelling appointments, updating your personal details, etc.

Should you wish to request a repeat prescription you can use our form on our website.

We thank you for your understanding and cooperation!

Kind regards,

Polyclinic team

International Health Centre the Hague

Updates over Monkeypox – Frequently asked questions

1) What is Monkeypox and what are the most common symptoms?

Monkeypox is a rare disease caused by an infection with the monkeypox virus. The possible symptoms (even though they are not always present) include: fever, headache, muscle pain, swollen lymph nodes, chills, tiredness. A few days after the fever, a skin rash with blisters appears. The blisters will eventually dry up and form a crust. The rash usually starts on the face and then spreads to the whole body.

2) When should I contact my GP or the sexual health clinic about specific symptoms?

• If you have blisters on your body, especially if the first blisters formed are located in the area around your anus, genitals or face;
• If you have had any contact (including sexual contact) with someone who has monkeypox within the past three weeks;
• If young children develop these symptoms, it almost always indicates a chickenpox infection. Therefore, there is no need for you to contact your GP unless you were in Central or West Africa in the past three weeks, or had direct contact with someone who has monkeypox within the past three weeks.

3) Is there any treatment or medicine for monkeypox?

There is a registered medicine authorised for treating monkeypox in patients admitted to the hospital with severe symptoms, however, it is not yet available in the Netherlands. The smallpox vaccine can also be used for monkeypox, both in the first few days after possible exposure to the monkeypox virus (post-exposure prophylaxis), and also preventively to protect people who have a higher risk of infection (currently, only laboratory workers working in high-risk laboratories with the monkeypox virus are vaccinated preventively). *We currently DO NOT administer monkeypox (smallpox) vaccinations at the International Health Centre.

More information:

More information about Monkeypox can be found on the RIVM website: https://www.rivm.nl/en/monkeypox 

We have had reports of some patients waiting for very long periods of time on the phone lines and unfortunately the call never connects to an assistant. We are working with our telephone service provider to identify the cause of this issue to resolve it as soon as possible. 

Should you have been waiting on the phone for more than 45minutes, it is likely that this is the case. If you are calling the GP practice, please send us an email at ihchgp@ezorg.nl with your name and telephone number so that we can call you back. For emergencies please select the emergency line. For the Polyclinic please email ihchpoli@ezorg.nl

We apologize for the inconvenience this may cause you and we greatly appreciate your patience while we work on resolving this issue.

IHCH Team

The national GPs union have organized a protest against the ever increasing and already over demanding workload and associated work pressure that GPs all over the Netherlands face.

The demonstration will take place on Friday July 1st 2022 in the afternoon from 13:00pm. 
This means that the GP practice will only be open for emergency appointments and emergency telephone calls on 01-07-22 from 13:00 – 17:00 pm. 

Normal working hours will resume on Monday 4th of July at 08:00 am. 

For more information about the demonstration visit this website (in Dutch).

We thank you for your understanding.

IHCH GP Team.