Asthma Medication

[optical]

I live in Suzhou, Jiangsu province and I need to buy asthma medication. I've gone to a few pharmacies (Green cross) and shown them the medication I need, which always seems to get the response of "What the hell is this?". I'm starting to get very nervous about finding a place to buy what I need, because if I run out I'm really going to be suffering.

This is what I need:

Advair Diskus 250/50

Flonase (Or Generic Flutiasone Propionate 50mcg spray)

Singulair Tabs (Not essential but great if I can find them)

I really, really, really don't want to go to Shanghai unless you know of a place I can go to that is within 5-10 minutes walking distance of Shanghai station.

Thanks everyone

[yonglin]

Hmm... what did you actually go to the pharmacy and ask for? Do you think the problem was that they did not understand what you were trying to get, or that they did not stock what you were trying to get? In general, it is quite problematic to ask for the branded name of a product, because the same product could be marketed in different regions under different names.

Advair is a combination of fluticasone and salmeterol. Maybe you could try asking for a product containing 沙美特罗+氟替卡松 ?

Flonase contains fluticasone (氟替卡松) only.

Singaulair contains Montelukast which is transcribed as 孟鲁司特.

Apart from that, I have little experience buying prescription medicines in China. However, I was under the impression that they sell prescription drugs almost exclusively in hospitals...? It may be the case that you have to get a local prescription...?!

[mr.stinky]

have you tried the online pharmacies based in india, canada, or the uk yet? i've ordered

through a few and have had no problems with customs or delivery.

[Quest]

Try to get a Chinese equivalent? maybe a visit to a local hospital.

[studentyoung]

Fluticasone propionate

Its Chinese name is丙酸氟替卡松(bing3 suan1 fu2 ti4 ka3 song1). I can find two kinds of nasal spray. One is called 辅舒良 (fu4 shu1 liang2), the other is 辅舒酮 (fu4 shu1 tong2).

http://image.baidu.com/i?ct=503316480&z=0&tn=baiduimagedetail&word=%B1%FB%CB%E1%B7%FA%CC%E6%BF%A8%CB%C9&in=10320&cl=2&cm=1&sc=0&lm=-1&pn=1&rn=1 (picture of 辅舒良)

http://image.baidu.com/i?ct=503316480&z=0&tn=baiduimagedetail&word=%B1%FB%CB%E1%B7%FA%CC%E6%BF%A8%CB%C9&in=31130&cl=2&cm=1&sc=0&lm=-1&pn=2&rn=1 (picture of 辅舒酮)

Singulair Tabs

Its Chinese name is 顺尔宁咀嚼片 （shun4 er3 ning2 ju3 jue2 pian4 ）.

http://image.baidu.com/i?ct=503316480&z=0&tn=baiduimagedetail&word=%CB%B3%B6%FB%C4%FE&in=6309&cl=2&cm=1&sc=0&lm=-1&pn=8&rn=1 (picture of 顺尔宁咀嚼片)

You can print the pictures out and search them in local drug stores.

Advair Diskus 250/50

The medicine is you are looking for is复方丙酸氟替卡松250txg/沙美特罗50txg粉雾剂(fu4 fang1 bing3 suan1 fu2 ti4 ka1 song1 2505xg/ sha1 mei3 te4 luo2 50txg fen3 wu4 ji4) produced by葛兰素史克公司(ge2 lan2 su4 shi3 ke4 gong1si1 ).

http://cache.baidu.com/c?word=%C9%CC%C6%B7%3B%C3%FB%3B%3A%3Badvair%2Cdiskus%2C250%2C50&url=http%3A//info%2Epharmacy%2Ehc360%2Ecom/HTML/001/002/9863%2Ehtm&p=8b2a944782934ea958adc52c584c9d&user=baidu

Flonase

It is called氟替卡松 (fu2 ti4 ka3 song1) in Chinese.

I'm sorry but it seems that Advair Diskus 250/50 and Flonase aren’t OTCs (Over the Counter), so you must get them in hospital with a doctor’s prescription.

Hope it helps. Anyway, good luck.

Cheers!

[hbuchtel]

Once you've found your medication you might want to see what they can do for you at your local Chinese medicine hospital.

See if you can get a recommendation for an internal medicine doctor who has experience treating asthma. The Western medical term is 哮喘 xiao4chuan3, the Chinese medical term is probably 哮病 xiao4bing4.

You can go get a diagnosis and prescription, you don't necessarily have to fill the prescription. If it is all herbal medicine it should be quite inexpensive- probably under 50 yuan.

You might be able to get your Western meds there as well.

Regards,

Henry

EDIT

From the website of the Suzhou TCM Hospital-

http://www.sztcm.org.cn/hospital/zdks.htm

苏州市中医医院针灸科在长期的医疗活动中积累了丰富的经验，主治肩周炎、面神经麻痹、中风半身不遂、带状疱疹、骨质增生、腰椎间盘突出症、坐骨神经痛等，对消化道疾病、哮喘等均有独特的治疗效果，在苏州地区具有广泛的影响。

It says their acupuncture dept is particularly good at treating asthma.

[optical]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks to your help, I was able to learn a lot more about this medication I need. Apparently yes, it is branded as Seretide in China and not Advair, the Chinese name is in fact 舒利迭 shu1 li4 die2.

Prices... this I'm not entirely clear on, but it seems that the different version cost different amounts, so the one I need, 250/50, (of course, notated backwards as 50/250) costs more than 100/50 (50/100). The price? Roughly somewhere between 300-400RMB per 1 months supply (60 dose) container. Expensive in term of Chinese prices, but disgustingly cheap in comparison to the American non-insured price ($300 USD per month, anyone?).

Supposedly I can buy this at the hospital on my campus after seeing a doctor. I'm going to go there tomorrow and see what I can figure out. Wish me luck!

[optical]

Found it!

Had to go to a major hospital's pharmacy to buy it after "seeing a doctor" (Read: telling him what I want and him scribbling it on a piece of paper). The price? 274 yuan per container, and they gave me 4 of them (4 months supply!) And according to my prescription print out my name is simply 'Rohent' I should change my name from Robert to Rohent since that is infinitely cooler.

Thanks again for your help everyone!

(In the picture, the one on the left is my container from America, on the right is one of the containers I just bought.)

[optical]

Just wanted to update, I found a large pharmacy just outside the guanqian shopping center that sells the medicine without needing to pay to see a doctor, their price is just 260 yuan (hospital is 273).

This makes me a bit more confused on if this medicine requires a "prescription" or not, but regardless it's the same stuff.