My first experience with a Chinese pharmacy [yaodian 药店] I was expecting it to be easier to find a nice little bottle of Tylenol to help with my son's fever. In fact, I even read on the internet that most pharmacies had medical dictionaries that you could just look up the kind of medicine you needed and easily find the Chinese name. Boy was that person wrong! Very few pharmacies have English-Chinese medical dictionaries. And the ones which do prove to be quite useless, unless you have at least one year of Med School under your belt. Good luck finding the word "tylenol" in that dictionary. Remember, that's a brand name. Of course, most people know the proper name for tylenol is Acetaminophen, but who the heck knows how to spell that?
On that particular day I ended up playing a game of charades with the pharmacist, if you can call her that, and then buying EVERYTHING they had that even remotely looked right. Then I got home and realized the instructions were all in Chinese. Needless to say, buying and taking medicine wasn't on my top ten list of things to do in China. It was however on my top ten least favorite things to do in China, right under going to the bank; two things I wouldn't wish on a mortal enemy. Thus the purpose of this article, hopefully today's post will help you navigate your way through a Chinese pharmacy.
First, let's start with some useful vocabulary:
Symptoms:
headache 头疼 [tóuténg]
sore throat 嗓子疼 [sǎngziténg]
stomach ache 肚子疼 [dùzi téng]
congested nose 鼻子不通气 [bízibùtōngqì]
runny nose 流鼻涕 [liú bítì]
sneeze 打喷嚏 [dǎ pēntì]
cough 咳嗽 [késou]
have a cold 感冒 [gǎnmào]
sinus infection 鼻窦炎 [bídòuyán]
sinus 鼻窦 [bídòu]
fun a fever 发烧 [fāshāo]
vomit 吐 [tù]
food poisioning 食品毒 [shí pǐn dú] Trust me, you'll need this one!
flu 流感 [liúgǎn]
To be allergic to 对...过敏 [dui...guòmǐn]
If you go up to the pharmacist and tell her 我 insert symptom here [wǒ insert symptom here], which isn't great Chinese, but it's good enough for her to get the point, then she will probably recommend a Chinese medicine to you. If you prefer western medicine you can tell her "wǒyào xīyào [我要西药]. At this point she'll offer you a couple of different types of medicines, if you're lucky there might be some English on the box. Remember, google is your friend. When in doubt, buy a couple of different types of medicines and then google the English or even the Pinyin to see what the medicine is exactly and how to take it.
If you already know exactly what type of medicine you want then you can just ask them if they have it. Below is a list of common western medicines you can readily find in China.
Medicine:
Acetaminophen 扑热息痛 [Pū rè xī tòng]
Tylenol 泰诺林 [Tài nuò lín]
Ibuprofen 布洛芬 [bù luò fēn]
Motrin 美林 [měi lín]
Tylenol Cough and Cold 美国强生泰诺 [měi gūo qiáng shēng tài nuò]
Smecta [for diarrhea] 思密达 [sī mì dá]Multi-Vitamins 维生素 [weí shēng sù]
Amoxycillan 阿莫西林 [Ā mò xī lín]
Ampicillian 氨苄西林 [Ān bīan xī lín]
Azithromycin 阿奇毒素 [Ā qí dú sù]
Cefaclor/Ceclor 头孢克洛 [tóu bāo kē luò]
Penicillian 盘尼西林 [pán ní xī lín]
Bufferin Cold and Flu 百服宁 [bǎi fú níng]
Claritin 开瑞坦 [kāi rùi tǎn]
Antihistimine 抗组胺药 [kàng zú ān yaò]
Aleve 萘普生钠 [Nài pǔ shēng nà]
Iodine 碘酒 [diǎn jǐu]
alcohol 酒精 [jǐu jīng]
Calamine Lotion 炉干石 [lú gān shí]
hydrocortisone 氰化可的松 [qīng huà kě dī sōng]
Tiger patch [Ben Gay] 老虎贴 [lǎo hǔ tǐe]
Instructions:
If you have the right vocabulary finding medicine is the easy part. Figuring out how to take it a different story though. The easiest thing to do is to just google the medicine and see if you can find instructions on how to take it. If this fails then you'll have to look on the box/bottle and try and decipher the encrypted Chinese. I'll see if I can guide you through the process. First look for something that says: 用法用量［yongfayongliang]. Then it will usually tell you how many pills to take per time 一次1粒 or it might say 一次1片. 一次 literally means "one time". 1粒/片 means "1 pill/tablet". Then the instructions usually tell you how many times you should take it in a day 一日2次. 一日 literally means "one day" and 2次 means "two times". So this particular medicine I picked up should be taken twice a day, one tablet each time. So basically look for 次, 日 and 片/粒 and the corresponding number remembering that 次 means times, 日 means day and 片/粒 means pill or tablet.
Liquid medicine is a little different. There will usually be a chart showing ages, amount to take, and how often you can take it. It looks something like this:
年龄 [岁］ 一次用量 次数
2-6 2.5 需要时每8小时服用一次，一日不超过3次.
The first column [年龄 岁] gives you the age group. The second column give you the dosage you should take each time [一次用量]. And the last column [次数] tells you how often you should, or more aptly put - CAN, take the medicine. This last column can be most confusing. Basically you need to look for the characters 小时, 日, and 次. 小时 means hours, so you can take this medicine every 8 hours. Remember, 日 means day 次 means times. So it reads 一日 [one day] 3次 [three times].
I know it's a bit complicated, but if worse comes to worse you can always try charades.
Taking my own medicine,
托马斯
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