jennjess

The only place where we found strict FFP2 rules in Italy was on the train, everywhere else the normal surgical mask was acceptable.

My experience is that nobody will check to see if you have had a test previous to arriving at the port of Pireaus.

No we didn't see that anywhere on the Jade. But they are amazingly well equipped to provide first line care.

Anyway a quick update on the situation and a question. Since we left the ship will they send an invoice to me at some point? We are due a number of reductions on the paid money. Excursions, gratuities, etc... My son has seen his doctor here and the hospital and the caste is removed, the metal staples will be removed today and later he has an appointment with the physio because we need to get the wrist moving asap. We have new flights booked and are going to continue our travels tomorrow. Fingers crossed all goes to plan.

Yes, this is a good summary of the situation. The first hospital we visited appeared more dangerous than no hospital at all. Really "third world". What we needed was a quick diagnosis and the ship could provide that for us and send us on. What they didn't provide was a working method to be able to contact them once we were onshore.

Thanks for the replies. We are cruising on Saturday so obviously outside the chance of getting any refund. But it looks like we can still go since I have managed to arrange his medical needs to be taken care of before we leave. He has a fit to travel letter from the doctor and hopefully won't need any further treatment onboard.

It really wasn't as simple as that. The x-rays showed a serious fracture that needed a metal plate to hold the bones together so they would heal in the correct position. That needed an operation not just a caste and obviously not something that could happen onboard. I have no problem with having to leave the ship to deal with that problem, the medical services onboard were quite happy for us to use their services (which we paid for) so not sure why anyone is complaining about us making use of their services. They were happy to take our money. My only complaint is the lack of followup by the company after we left. Still haven't had a reply from the emails I sent a week ago to guest relations. We were only there in the first place to cruise (which we paid for) and that cannot be compared to a simple flight from A to B or a one night stay in a hotel. I feel they could have tried to offer a bit more assistance than they did. Didn't expect them to pay for any of it just to show an interest in our situation. Would I book a cruise with them again? possibly, if it was an itinerary that really appealed but they will always have a mark against them for me when it comes to customer care.

Thank you for your kind reply. It's not until things go wrong that you realise how much your custom is appreciated.

I just received a post cruise survey from NCL, I guess they thought we were still onboard afterall. Obviously can't answer any of it since we didn't really cruise at all.

NCL could have called and asked how it was going, could they be of any assistance, told me the additional items I had booked and paid for would be reimbursed and how we could rejoin the cruise at a later port. But they didn't, it was out of sight, out of mind.

If you were in a foreign country would you know where to go in the middle of a traumatic experience.

Medical evacuations I imagine are not cheap!

The doctor would not have been able to anticipate what my health care insurance would consider appropriate care. All I needed at that point was an xray and diagnosis.

I think in the UK people have little idea of what medical procedures cost due to the NHS. Here we have semi private health care and the costs are pretty high but US prices are the highest of all.

I had pain meds with me, I always carry a supply of basic drugs I think might be needed. He had them plus the hotel organised ice for him to bring any swelling down.

Yes the accident happened on the way back to the hotel for the night about 9.00 PM. The first thing I did was ask the advice of the reception. It was either the doctor or the public hospital. There didn't seem much point in the doctor since he obviously needed a photo made which couldn't be done by a visiting doctor. There are 2 kinds of hospital in Greece public or private. The public one is free, the private are not. The public hospital did not seem the best option for his care. It was better to visit the medical service onboard as we would be there next day anyway.

Thank you and it's interesting that you are one of the only people to have said that. He is doing fine just very irritated by being one armed for the time being.

He himself wanted to leave the hospital and maybe if you had been there you would have wanted to too. It was 11.30 PM and very busy, many patients lying on trolleys in a very bad state of health in the corridors. He may not have been seen for many hours. As a parent you want the best care for your child surely and I trusted the NCL medical services more than this particular hospital. He wasn't in terrible pain or we would have stayed and waited it out. The hospital he eventually was treated in was very good of a standard you would expect in the USA or Western Europe. I meant that I knew that NCL medical services would charge me but I felt more comfortable with their diagnosis than the first place we visited.

It would have been enormously comforting if nothing else to know someone cared about the situation we were in. Since we had paid for their services I do feel they had some duty of care.

I have private insurance, separate health and travel insurance. I now have the task of deciding who covers which bits of the emergency and have a stack of papers that need to be sent to one or the other.

I never expected the medical services to be included in my fare, and never said that, and knew I had to pay for it. The doctor would have been of no real use since he would just have referred him to a hospital for an x-ray which was what he needed. I knew there was an x-ray machine onboard the ship. That x-ray showed it was a fracture that needed an operation to repair. I have no complaints about the medical services onboard just the quality of the followup by NCL.

Not sure why you think it was wrong of us to make use of NCL's medical services when we paid for those services and we had every right to board the ship which we had also paid for. I trusted them far more than I did the first hospital I visited. They atleast spoke a language I could communicate in easily which was not the case at the first hospital we visited.

Far from it, we have travelled alot but never had a health emergency before. Until it happens to you, you are not aware of how difficult an experience it can be. A little bit more involvement from the company would have been very reassuring.

I had no way to contact the ship otherwise I would have done so. I had the phone number of the port agent, 2 email addresses of guest relations which I emailed but have still not had an answer and a number in the USA which nobody answered or called me back. We tried to rejoin the ship on Thursday by flying to the port that day, only to find that the ship could not dock as the weather was extremely windy. Again another set back. After that decided just to fly back home as all was lost.

Just to clarify NCL didn't book a hotel for us at all, this was what I was told by the nurse at the first hospital but this was a miscommunication at the very least. We went there, there was no reservation but we were tired and stressed and just glad to have found a room for the night. I then contacted our insurance company who arranged the best hospital for us to visit the next day with a guarantee that they would be reimbursed by our insurance. The one call I recieved from NCL said they would contact the port agent to provide further help and advice. Don't know if they did but I called the port agent myself and he told me his responsibilty was just to get us to a hospital and nothing else. It would just have been nice to have recieved another call from NCL in the following days with some advice or concern about our situation.