We could pretend at planning all we liked, but no Antarctic plans could officially be made – especially plans that required outlay of money, such as airfare – until I had passed the Physical Qualification.
When Apsley Cherry-Garrard was applying to join the Terra Nova Expedition, he was told to turn up at the Expedition offices ‘prepared for a full medical examination.’ Presumably it all happened in one go. Mine was … not like that. I know that most people reading this blog are looking for entertainment, but perhaps you are preparing to undergo the same gauntlet. For your sake, dear grantee, I have tried to frame my experience as advice.
The US Antarctic Program’s medical screening is overseen by the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. After I had passed some invisible threshold in the process in April, they sent me a packet with instructions for obtaining the information they wanted to see. A full medical examination was part of it – every orifice was to be probed, many labelled ‘NOT DEFERRABLE’ – as well as a cursory eye exam, extensive blood tests, and a dental exam with complete X-rays.
Me and my frienemy, the PQ packet
The instructions for completing one’s medical stressed getting it in as early as possible, as the small team of doctors is swamped with applicants late in the summer when deadlines are tight. So, as soon as I got my packet, I started making appointments. The dental was taken care of within a week. To my surprise, given the moaning about NHS wait times, I got the necessary appointments booked all within the month of May. Everything seemed to be going well until the very last appointment, an ECG, which turned up a slight aberration in my heartbeat. My doctor said she couldn’t sign off the packet until it was unequivocally proven this wasn’t a health risk … so instead of mailing in my packet at the beginning of June as I had planned to do, I sat on it all the way through July so that I could have a full barrage of cardiovascular tests. These all came out clear, thankfully, so in the first week of August my packet was signed and FedExed to Texas. I avidly tracked its progress online and breathed a sigh of relief when it arrived, unimpeded by hurricanes or protests. Thank goodness that’s over with!
Ha, ha.
When the packet was received and examined, it was found wanting; the general pattern to the requests – which trickled in over several weeks, rather than all in one go – highlighted the fact that the packet had been designed by an American institution, to be completed by American doctors, and there were some important assumptions made which the British system didn’t pick up on. Resolving these discrepancies took six weeks of phone calls, hunting down paperwork, and rushing last-minute procedures.
Addenbrooke’s Hospital and Biomedical Campus, destination of many a hasty bike ride
So, should you be facing your PQ in the States, my advice is this: Book your appointments early, and be advised that probably none of this will be covered by your insurance, as your swanning off to Antarctica is completely elective. The NSF doesn’t cover it, either. It ain’t gonna be cheap, but it will probably be less than a commercial cruise to the Ross Sea. Probably.
If you are applying from the UK, or any other country with a similar single-payer national health system, here’s the scoop:
As per the above, book your appointments as soon as possible, because you never know what follow-up will be necessary. Additional incentive to haste is that everyone goes on holiday in July and August, so getting hold of a doctor or secretary becomes much harder as the summer goes on.
Socialised medicine is a boon and a blessing but it is not tremendously accommodating of elective procedures being done on a tight deadline. Your blood tests and specialist follow-ups, being of minimum medical urgency, go to the end of the queue. This is great for the person who needs prompt diagnosis of leukaemia, say, but not you.
As this is all elective, you will have to pay privately. Most GPs in the UK offer private appointments, but you may find speedier service at a private clinic. It will probably cost the same anyway. Again, it’s not cheap, but it’s cheaper for you than for someone in the States, so count your blessings.
The medical board want to see every bit of data that led your doctor to approve you for Antarctic travel. This means including printouts of all your blood test results, your ECG, and records/receipts for any new vaccinations in the packet you send to Texas. If you have had any medical issues in the last few years, or been tested for anything serious at all even if the results were negative, they want to see the paperwork for those too. In the NHS, some of this paperwork requires special permission to access, for which you must apply, and it might take a month to process. On the other hand, you may get lucky by phoning the original clinic and explaining your situation to the right people. Everyone thinks going to Antarctica is really cool. Sometimes strings can be pulled.
On the NHS, the tetanus/polio/diptheria vaccine does NOT come with the pertussis vaccine included, which the USAP requires. You must find somewhere that will give you the pertussis-inclusive bundle, either a travel clinic or a private GP. Pertussis does not come on its own so there’s no point getting the regular booster until you find a source for the all-inclusive one.
Blood type is not on the checklist in the packet because it’s standard in US blood tests, but the NHS does not ascertain or record your blood type as a matter of course. You must tell your doctor that you need your blood group and Rhesus factor determined as well as all the other tests, otherwise you will have to get another blood test on short notice and wait for the results all over again.
If UTMB want supplemental documents, they will only accept physical mail or faxes. Posting something to the US is too slow, and couriering a succession of documents may bankrupt you, but you can send a fax online from gotfreefax.com – it’s free up to three pages and pocket change for more. They take PayPal. It’s much easier than finding a fax machine.
Having received my packet in April, I only got passed by the medical board on 21 September. I’d had to gamble on booking international flights to get to the US jumping-off point, because if I waited until I had PQ’d, the point at which I officially joined the programme, airfares would have been ridiculous.
Cherry was accepted onto the Terra Nova Expedition two days after his examination and interview, five weeks before the ship sailed from London. In spite of my vastly longer lead time, I passed my PQ four weeks and five days before my flight out of Heathrow. Sometimes those 109 years between us seem very thin.
It was an anxious summer, and there were times I sincerely doubted I would get to go at all, but back in August I decided that it would take more effort to prepare for the best than the worst, so I started amassing some of the recommended clothing and the gear I planned to take with me. Next time: Antarctic Shopping!