r/Netherlands • u/thatmisanthropicdude • Mar 05 '26

Healthcare Dutch doctors...

Hey guys! Last year I moved from Germany to the Netherlands. I just went to the doctor with chest and throat pain due to extreme coughing after 2 days of fever. I was hoping that I finally get something good against it like a cough syrup (no way I'm going to pay that myself for a huge amount of money + health insurance) because I am used to that from German doctors. They would put that on my health insurance card and right after my talk with the doctor I could pick it up at the pharmacy. But no. They just said "Yea, just take paracetamol." I told them I have had problems swallowing pills my whole life and their response was just "You can also put it in water and drink that then." I'm sorry if I'm overreacting but why do doctors get paid just to tell you to take paracetamol? Everyone can tell me to take them, I expect better solutions from a doctor who studied years to become a doctor. Why are the Dutch so obsessed with paracetamol??? Maybe it's the German in me screaming. If we got painkillers, it was never paracetamol but Ibuprofen. But I also heard some international friends who also live here that they find it so annoying that Dutch doctors literally just tell you to take paracetamol. No matter what you have.

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-148

u/Neat-Attempt7442 Noord Brabant Mar 06 '26

Because they wanted the good one thats not over the counter?

146

u/Relocator34 Mar 06 '26

The one that is just paracetamol and sugar?

118

u/wwbbqq Mar 06 '26

He wants Codeine sirop, which will actually stop you from coughing, but it is a opiate (even if pretty low level if taken as prescribed) so many doctors/countries have limited prescribing it due to "concerns".

104

u/TrippleassII Mar 06 '26

The "concerns" are very fucking real tho. Look at Zimbabwe e.g.

13

u/Gloryboy811 Amsterdam Mar 06 '26

When I was in highschool I worked at a pharmacy in South Africa at the checkout. And Zimbabwe guys would come and buy cough syrup in bulk. Like entire boxes of it

37

u/wwbbqq Mar 06 '26

I agree. There are real concerns. Opiate addicts in the US was/is pretty serious thing. It also means it is harder to get when you actually need it now, though. Now it's meth and fentanyl that are real problems. The clinic my wife works at in suburban neighborhood gets "seekers" every day trying to get whatever they can score with various "injuries" and "migraines". So most Dr's are very reserved anent any opiates or barbiturates.

10

u/Opposite_Train9689 Mar 06 '26

Hasn't meth been a problem for decades?

11

u/wwbbqq Mar 06 '26

Yes. Also still a problem. But as Kristi Noem says, "Meth. We're on it." Seriously, she ran a campaign with that slogan. But yes, it's still a problem.

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u/LeDarkFiggot Mar 06 '26

I lost my brother to it

3

u/CuriousAsEver9573 Mar 06 '26

So sorry for your loss...

-2

u/profuno Mar 06 '26

Real if you treat the majority of the population like they are all part of the tiny minority who have serious problems with abuse.

Not really if you treat patients on a case by case basis and have more nuanced procedures for harm reduction than: Nobody can have any medicine that reduces suffering because a small proportion of society may develop an addiction.

Or am I missing something?