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Sick at Disney World? Urgent Care Options

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What happens when you are sick at Disney World? Crying. Crying happens, even if you are a mom in your 40s who should know better! Maybe that’s just me? There are options for you to get care when you are sick in the House of Mouse that include Urgent Care and in-room doctor visits.

 

A few years back I spent a wonderful week at Walt Disney World as a guest of the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration.

Here’re a few links you can read about the event (what I wore, what surprised me,??and how I rocked).

Reading these posts it looks like it was all fun and games, but, man, it didn’t start off well.

Here’s a little story of the time a 41-year-old mom of four got pink eye for the first time.

I boarded a plane super stupid early on Wednesday in Phoenix.

How stupid early? I had to be awake at 2:45 am in order to make my plane.

Yes, I will give up sleep if a castle and drinks at Trader Sam’s are involved.

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

Trust me- it was so worth it!?

After settling into my bulkhead seats, I decided to close my eyes and nap for the first leg.

Upon waking, I noticed one of my eyes was really bothering me. I chalked it up to a possible torn contact or maybe just dry eyes from lack of sleep.

As the day went on, it hurt more and more. I basically wanted to scratch my own eye out of my head.

After consulting Dr. Google, I knew I had pink eye. Gross.

I took out the contact in the offending eye but had to keep the other one in.

Because… I didn’t bring my glasses. ?And I’m super blind.

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.
Sunglasses to cover the weepy eye. I was not amused.

 

Sick at Disney World

I called the front desk at the Yacht Club to ask what my options were for visiting an urgent care.

Guys: ?ONE question?could have made this entire post (and miserable day) MUCH shorter.

Let’s see if anyone else catches the ONE very important detail I assumed I knew the answer.

Call goes like this:

Me: Hiiiiiii… I’m in pain, so much pain, nothing major contagious or life-threatening though I want to rip my eye out.

Oh wait, I think it is contagious but not like confined to my ROOM contagious. But there’s pain.

Front Desk: ?Um… hello? Do you need 911?

Me:?Noooo, no, nothing like that. I’m just a bad patient.

I tend to exaggerate.

And whine.

Um, yeah… can you tell where the nearest urgent care facility is located?

Front Desk:?Oh good, I’m glad you aren’t dying (said without sarcasm… I think).

We can send a doctor to your room as we have one on call!

Or I can request the Centra Care van to pick you up and take you to the urgent care facility.

Me:?Oh, send the van (because I’m SURE that in-house doctor would be WAY too expensive for me! ?AHEM.)

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

Urgent Care at Disney World

The van arrived within 15 minutes and I just knew I’d be on my way to healthy eyes within the hour.

Oh, how wrong I was.

A little tip from you brought about by hindsight: ALL Walt Disney World Resort Guests are given these same options when they are sick and call the front desk.

Think about that.

ALL of them.

I walked into the Urgent Care and was met with an entirely full waiting room of sick travelers.

People were shivering from fever, hacking up lungs, sneezing, scratching, and even puking all over the place.

It was a war zone and the germs were winning.

And I was FREAKING the EFF OUT.

I don’t do well with sick people, and I had a conference to attend, and I was AT WALT DISNEY WORLD!

I needed to get out of there and fast.

I called in the cavalry.

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

CVS Minute Clinics Near Disney World

This is Jane, and she is awesome.

She’s an Orlando local & running buddy and I LOVE her.

She took me down the road to a?CVS Minute Clinic.

Also: Jane asked me not to give out her number for rides (whatever, Jane!) so another option is taking Uber or Lyft from your Orlando hotel room.

It might cost you about $15 but it’s better than the free van that was fullll of sick peeps, IMO.

Where this happened:

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

Oh, Lawdy- praise JESUS- my eye was going to get fixed.

CVS Minute Clinic (and smarty Jane) to the rescue.

I wish I could say that I was in and out in a matter of minutes, but that’s not exactly what happened.

My frustration level peaked when I discovered that I left my ID and insurance card at the other clinic.

So we drove back to the first clinic for it.

And then the pharmacist went to lunch right after my appointment.

This meant those eye drops I desperately needed would take an hour to cross the counter to me. Tech had them in his hand, but couldn’t give them to me.

Y’all. I can’t even with this day.

It did end well: while waiting for my ride back to Disney I discovered this across the street.

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

When life gives you pink eye, you get donuts.

And a reality check.

I really didn’t have anything to complain about.

Yes, the eye thing and the loss of time sucked, but let’s be honest: #FirstWorldProblems.

The pink eye was treatable, I was good to go within a few hours, and didn’t have any issues the rest of the trip. Huzzah!

Did you figure out what question I should have asked?

Let’s flashback to that discussion I had with the front desk.

I wish it had gone like this:

Me: Oh? An in-house doctor? How much?does that cost?

Front Desk: ?$125, and you can wait in the comfort of your germ-free deluxe room watching TV, working, or taking a nap until she arrives!

Whaaaa???? My bill at the urgent care was $80 and took 8 hours of my time to accomplish.

Plus there was a lot of tears, frustration, and puke along the route.

And I probably needed an eye patch.

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

 

So right there is the moral of the story.

ASK, don’t assume?when you are given options.

Have you ever gotten sick while on vacation? Do you have a travel urgent care story you want to share?

 

What happens when you are sick at Disney World? You have Urgent Care options. OR you can get an in-house doctor to visit.

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11 Comments

  1. I broke my tailbone when I was 21 in Venice, Italy. I slipped and fell on some marble stairs (no I hadn’t been drinking) and was in SO much pain. Try and convey in very broken Italian that you have a very broken butt to a “farmacia” in Venice because you need to buy A. A donut pillow to sit on as you are about to board a train for the next five hours and B. Some painkillers of the extra strength variety. Fun fact, the pharmacist was able to just give me hydrocodone, no doctor involved. So I had no idea I was given such a strong painkiller until after I had taken it. I don’t really remember the train ride or the lovely Italian countryside.

  2. I once needed a simple battery for a glucose meter – and I had NO idea what I needed. Other than. You know, a battery for my meter.

    So went to the front desk at the lovely Saratoga Springs, and asked if there was a pharmacy onsite. No, but we can call one for you. They called, I talked, they would deliver me the battery.
    Now, I knew that battery would run about 5 bucks…and then I started to worry about how much on earth would they charge me to deliver it. Imagine my great relief when it was only about 125% of the cost of the battery — so I got off pretty cheap!!

    Then there was the time very recently when I ran a marathon in Paris France and had a HORRIBLE episode of chafing…try asking for neosporin in sort of French…

  3. Oh man! So glad that’s all it was but what a literal pain! If it helps, you look good in your pics! Glad you were able to get it taken care of so you could enjoy the rest of the trip!

  4. When we were at art of animation this past November for wine and dine my friend and I were running through the grass to catch a shuttle to magic kingdom. Some of the nature bit her and she is super allergic to bites so her foot swelled up huge (fast forward to ME pushing HER in the wheelchair through MK the day after a soggy midnight half marathon… I can laugh about it now) and became infected. We went to the front desk and they offered to call the ER and we made sure to ask how much this would cost. They said the paramedics would come and do a free evaluation (on the property is free) so when they came they took her to a private room off the lobby and they diagnosed her. She then called a nearby doctor that took her healthcare and she told them the paramedics recommendation and the doctor called in the prescription to a nearby pharmacy and it was delivered to art of animation for $40! Voilaaa! I’m sorry about your goose chase but so happy you were able to get medicine!

  5. We unfortunately are now familiar with an urgent care in Orlando. Day #4 in disney i started coughing and having a sore throat. Day #5 i had no voice and hubs said he had a sore throat. That night we were in aquarium area after Nemo ride in Epcot. I turn around and hubs was laying in the floor. Said it just hit him all at once. Sent my dad back to room with him. 4 am he wakes me up and says he needs urgent care. I wake up my parents in another room and leave the 2 year old with them. We drove so I Googled and confirmed insurance in-network. 20 minute drive and they were closed. OK choice #2. Nope. Not even in existence. Choice #3 yes!! By this time hubs was shaking and vomiting. He was positive for the flu!! I had bronchitis. We drove from Kentucky. Horrible road trip home. I followed up with my family dr and was at beginning of pneumonia and was put on bed rest for a week. Oh and the 2 year old had strep throat. Disney about killed us!

  6. Oh and there was a possibly I had the flu too but the dr didn’t have any more tests and it was more important to test hubs because he was so sick. So we just crossed our fingers for me. And we BOTH had flu shots a month prior to vacation.

  7. I’m glad you had a local friend to rescue you! Pink eye can be so irritating. I hope to never need an urgent care visit on my WDW trips- but this is great info just in case!

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