Not really a bad idea, but still.
I (male) have a fertility condition that means in the future I’ll have to get 3 injections of hcg a week to be fertile. I asked the doctor and all he said was “you can’t give yourself an injection in Japan”
Struck me as odd because I’ve been able to get hcg and self inject no problem in US. Is it illegal? Or will I have to go to the doctor 3x a week for months!?
21 comments
EDIT: okay, I’ll leave this up as penance, but will admit I was very wrong about this–my apologies.
Syringes are unavailable here, for basically the reason your doc told you.
If you had one, or more, and happened to get randomly stopped/searched by police, I think this would be on par with having drugs, or maybe a weapon.
Not true. My wife did injections at home for fertility treatment (IIRC, some gonadotropin preparation). We had a sharps container that we brought back in to the clinic for proper disposal. Different clinics have different policies I suppose.
It is true that syringes are less commonly available, but they aren’t completely unavailable. It may depend on the exact medication.
For my diabetic cat, We were receiving syringes with the right dose of insuline. Maybe you can receive your medication with the syringe in the same way ?
Completely legal as long as it is prescribed by a doctor.
And it usually means a week in the hospital for “training” on how to inject properly.
Source: previous personal experience.
Yup these guys are onto it, get prescribed by a doctor with the training. Fertility clinics in japan are looking for repeat customers.
I truly wish the best for you mate and hope that you receive good news from your partner over the next 6 months.
Not true. A friend of mine has a child with a condition
that requires monthly injections. They do them at home.
I bet the doctor requires patients to come in so they can be charged for the procedure. Cynical, but considering your situation I wouldn’t be surprised!
I don’t know about your particular substance, but it’s not true in general that you can’t inject yourself (I have friends who are diabetic).
Self injecting is fine. Japan is a bit weird about needles
It’s legal. Some shots aren’t, for instance my biologics require me to come in every three months, but my monthly migraine biologics I can do at home.
I don’t know why certain meds are approved for at home use and certain meds aren’t. So much time and money could be saved otherwise.
My personal experience after living in Japan close to 20 years is you have to shop around for a cool doctor. I recommend a general medicine doctor and if you need a specialist your general doctor would need to refer you to a specialist. I have low testosterone and my general doctor referred me to a specialist and then I visited 6 or 7 specialist before I found one that would work with me the way I wanted. Also my general doctor will prescribe anything I request as long as I have an informed and researched reason.
I’ve been getting a HCG shot weekly for a couple of years now and it is a bit inconvenient to have to go to the doctor every week. Fortunately, the hospital is minutes from my office. For some dosages they have special use take-home syringes that are approved. Women on IVF might get those, AFAIK (and based on what the doctor told me and some info on a fertility clinic’s website). My dosage is different and therefore requires the visit. Good luck!
Tell that to any diabetic in japan haha
Edit: that is insulin dependent
Aren’t self shots what keep diabetic people alive ? …
Sometimes Japanese people mistake things they think of as common sense, for whatever reason they think of them as sensible, as the actual law.
There are several comments disputing this doctor and I would point out it’s simply impractical for things like diabetes: it *must* be possible to do your own injections.
Find another doctor.
I have an Epipen and my friend has insulin, so it’s obviously not illegal to self inject.
Sounds like another doctor who doesn’t know and just take a wild guess
Go to the imperial clinic in Hibiya. Doctor Iwamoto will give you what you need.
It’s legal to inject oneself. Whether it’s legal with hcg is another question.
The law was in fact that only a doctor could give an injection, but that made it sort of challenging for people with diabetes. So I think there developed a practice of allowing family members to provide home care, and I would be surprised if they haven’t expanded it so that licensed caregivers can administer injections to people in care homes etc. But I wouldn’t be surprised if they never got around to allowing the patient to self-administer injections.
So try going to a different doctor and say your spouse or whatever will give the shot and they already give insulin shots to an elder parent, see if you get a different answer.
As others have noted this is completely untrue. My wife has been using an injectable skin treatment biweekly for the past three years, and also carries an epipen for emergency use. For the epipens one kind of weird requirement is she has to return any unused pens after they expire (presumably to prevent misuse by drug addicts).
It’s a total lie.
My doctor said the same thing.
You 100% can give yourself an injection in Japan. I don’t know why doctors lie about this.
I don’t want to explain openly on reddit. You can PM for some more details.