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Sunday, March 16, 2025

Healthcare providers dive into Carnival

by

GEISHA KOWLESSAR-ALONZO
17 days ago
20250226

T&T’s Car­ni­val is not on­ly a ma­jor tourist at­trac­tion, but it is al­so a provider to sev­er­al spin-off of­fer­ings even in the pri­vate health sec­tor.

From a “mo­bile hos­pi­tal” be­ing pro­vid­ed by Spir­it Mas to im­mu­ni­ty boost­ers to med­ical grade sil­i­cone to di­min­ish the ap­pear­ance of scars to fete patch­es, mas­quer­aders are be­ing af­ford­ed nu­mer­ous op­tions when comes to stay­ing fit and look­ing fresh.

Tak­ing it one step fur­ther, Spir­it Mas, which has been in ex­is­tence for two years, has teamed up with Med­ical As­so­ciates Hos­pi­tal, St Joseph for the first time this year to “bring next-lev­el re­hy­dra­tion and re­cov­ery drips” straight to its rev­ellers, ac­cord­ing to a post on its so­cial me­dia page stat­ed.

Ac­cord­ing to the post, pack­ages in­clude:

• ↓Ba­sic—Stay fresh & hy­drat­ed

• ↓En­er­gy boost—Pow­er through the vibes

• ↓Su­per­charged flu­ids—Max sta­mi­na, no lim­its

• ↓Hang­over cure—Bounce back FAST

• ↓Im­mu­ni­ty builder—Fete HARD, stay healthy

• ↓Ready for D Road—The ul­ti­mate pre-road fix

While this is of­fered to Spir­it Mas mas­quer­aders, oth­er mas lovers can go in­to to Med­ical As­so­ciates to get these ser­vices that range in price from $400 to $1000.

How­ev­er, Spir­it Mas rev­ellers who col­lect­ed their cos­tumes this week had an ad­van­tage as Med­ical As­so­ciates per­son­nel were on hand to give ad­vice on these pack­ages and for their mas­quer­aders de­sirous of these ser­vices to pre­book ses­sions.

Re­gard­ing the de­ci­sion to part­ner with Med­ical As­so­ciates, CEO of Spir­it Mas, Adri­an Scoon said, “Spir­it Mas is a cus­tomer-cen­tred com­pa­ny and we want to en­sure our mas­quer­aders have a road ex­pe­ri­ence that is as safe as it is en­joy­able. Our re­cov­ery team has been there from in­cep­tion to en­sure our mas­quer­aders stay hy­drat­ed and re­freshed through­out both day. How­ev­er, this sea­son we want­ed to pro­vide even more sup­port to our mas­quer­aders, and that’s why we de­cid­ed to part­ner with Med­ical As­so­ciates and in­clude a mo­bile hos­pi­tal in our road con­voy.”

Along with the Med­ical As­so­ciates mo­bile hos­pi­tal, the band will fea­ture:

—↓Re­cov­ery team with mo­bile carts stocked with cold wa­ter and en­er­gy drinks

—Cold tow­els

—Re­cov­ery bus­es

—Re­fresh­ment sta­tions at se­lect vend­ing booths at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah, a part­ner­ship with the Car­ni­val En­tre­pre­neurs As­so­ci­a­tion.

Scoon added this par­tic­u­lar ini­tia­tive is sup­port­ed by its spon­sor Sco­tia­bank.

Ser­vices of­fered in the mo­bile hos­pi­tal in­clude emer­gency ser­vices (cuts, bruis­es) and op­tion­al hy­dra­tion pack­ages.

Al­liance Med­ical Ser­vices lo­cat­ed in Ch­agua­nas is of­fer­ing two kinds of IV bags as it is ad­vis­ing rev­ellers, “Don’t fall prey to fete fa­tigue, danc­ing de­hy­dra­tion or those hor­ri­ble hang­overs this Car­ni­val sea­son.”

Al­liance Med­ical de­scribes its Road Ready IV Bag as “an IV cock­tail spe­cial­ly for­mu­lat­ed to get you ready for the road by boost­ing your im­mune sys­tem and en­er­gy lev­els, im­prov­ing hy­dra­tion and en­hanc­ing your Car­ni­val ex­pe­ri­ence.

“Its Road Re­viv­er IV Bag is an IV Cock­tail specif­i­cal­ly for­mu­lat­ed to re­vive you af­ter those mis­er­able hang­overs and give you that ex­tra need­ed boost to con­tin­ue on with the fes­tiv­i­ties.”

Both cost $500 each.

Over-the-counter items like fete patch­es con­tin­ue to be a big sell­er every Car­ni­val, one phar­ma­cist told the Busi­ness Guardian.

One pack, which comes with two patch­es re­tails at $30 and promis­es to be an “easy hang­over so­lu­tion.” In­gre­di­ents in­clude 50mg of thi­amine (vi­t­a­min B1).

The phar­ma­cist al­so shared that med­ical-grade sil­i­cone, which sells at around $300 a tube and promis­es that scars are “re­duced, flat­tened and fad­ed” with re­sults “seen in as lit­tle as two weeks” is al­so a top sell­er.

He al­so not­ed that Sim­ply L-Car­ni­tine 3000 is al­so a pop­u­lar buy dur­ing this sea­son as he ex­plained that L-Car­ni­tine 3000 is a sup­ple­ment that sup­ports fat loss, boosts en­er­gy and en­hances per­for­mance.

Mean­while, oth­er pri­vate health fa­cil­i­tates are of­fer­ing dif­fer­ent health pack­ages which fo­cus on spe­cif­ic needs.

For in­stance, Ari­ma Pri­vate Hos­pi­tal which is al­so us­ing so­cial me­dia as one of its mark­ing strat­e­gy is of­fer­ing kid­ney, liv­er and cho­les­terol pro­file tests for $600.

While its”Full Car­ni­val Health Pack­age for just $800” cov­ers kid­ney, liv­er and cho­les­terol pro­file tests as well as ECG ( elec­tro­car­dio­gram) and CBC (com­plete blood count) tests.

Safe­guard­ing one’s sex­u­al health is al­so para­mount dur­ing Car­ni­val time.

Sev­er­al pri­vate clin­ics have been ad­vis­ing peo­ple to know their sta­tus by ad­ver­tis­ing screen­ing pack­age for STIs (Sex­u­al­ly Trans­mit­ted In­fec­tion) with same-day re­sults.

For in­stance, Tri­care Med­ical Cen­tre at Heart­land Plaza, Ch­agua­nas is of­fer­ing two pack­ages.

Pack­age one in­cludes HIV, he­pat­i­tus B, syphillis (vene­re­al dis­ease re­search lab­o­ra­to­ry test), her­pes 1&2 an­ti­bod­ies at $550 while pack­age two in­cludes HIV, he­pat­i­tus B, syphilis (vene­re­al dis­ease re­search lab­o­ra­to­ry test) her­pes 1&2 an­ti­bod­ies, Gon­or­rhoea and Clamy­dia at $1,100.

Oth­er pri­vate clin­ics are al­so urg­ing peo­ple to know their HIV sta­tus dur­ing Car­ni­val, and even af­ter the sea­son, are of­fer­ing the test ei­ther dri­ve-thru or in of­fice for $80 with re­sults with­in 15 min­utes.


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