Friday, July 30, 2010

ASOCIMAI is in Facebook!

ASOCIMAI or the American Society of CIM Alumni Inc. has joined the social networking trend and is in Facebook. You can access the ASOCIMAI Facebook page by typing ASOCIMAI at the Facebook searchbox and clicking the LIKE button. After that, you can post comments, post and join the discussion among fellow CIM alumni. You can also receive regular updates. Cool, isn't it? So far, 114 people has LIKED the page.


Why not join the ASOCIMAI activities especially if you are a CIM Alumni based in the US and Canada? For after all, this organization is dedicated to the fellowship and support of the alumni of the Cebu Institute of Medicine, Cebu City, Philippines. Of course, the ASOCIMAI official website is still at http://www.asocimai.org.

Monday, July 26, 2010

A Review of Panglao Tropical Villa, Bohol

Doctors take vacations too and one favorite place often visited by doctors in Cebu is Bohol. This blog post gets to review one particular destination in Bohol which is Panglao Tropical Villa.

Panglao Tropical Villa is located in Panglao Island, Bohol. Panglao Island is known for each beautiful beaches. Unfortunately, the beaches in Panglao Tropical Villa is not its strong selling point. However, the location is, as advertised, a good place for guests to feel at home. It is probably a good taking point for those who will tour Bohol and go for dolphin watching, diving and other adventures. The villas themselves have themes. The Villa Angelus (where we stayed) for example has a Filipino theme with its nipa materials and bahay kubo appearance.

The villa provides a temporary home complete with amenities such as cable TV, some cooking utensils, a cooking grill, gas stove, refrigerator, water dispenser (hot and warm only, not cold) and comfortable rooms that give a "home-y" atmosphere. You can do the cooking yourself with your own raw ingredients or have the cooking done by in-house staff using the villa's own stock of ingredients of course with a fee. The price for the stay is reasonable. (Refer to their website at http://www.panglaotropicalvillas.com/ for their rates). But prices of goods such as softdrinks or sodas are double the regular price and 1 gallon water refill is much higher at P100.00 per gallon.



The villa also has vehicles for rent like a motorcycle which you yourself can use for travelling to the market for instance. They also have a van for hire with driver for your travel needs like touring Bohol.

The villa is good for families who prefer a private vacation spot. It has 2 pools. A swimming pool for kids and a swimming pool for adults which may go as deep as 8 feet perhaps equipped with a diving board. They appear to be well-maintained and clean. There are no lifeguards so dive at your own risk and make sure children really are accompanied by adults when swimming.

There are other ways for recreation in the villa. There is a beach volleyball "court", a billiards table and pingpong table with net. You can borrow the respective balls from the restaurant.

Speaking of restaurant, the villa does have a restaurant although we haven't tried dining there but it seems nice. We once had "sinugbang" milkfish and "molmol" done by their personnel and they tasted good.

It might be boring though to just stay in the villa the whole time without exploring Bohol. The villa have people who offer dolphin watching at around P2000. There are several small boats or "bancas" standing by in the resort for this.
They also offer tour packages to the Chocolate Hills, Loboc River Cruise, Hanging Bridge, Tarsier site, Bilar man-made forest, and many more.

But when it comes to the beach, do not expect a very nice beach for swimming. Most of the time when we were there, it was low tide and the beaches are not as crystal clear as other beaches such as those found in Camotes in Cebu. The view is not also as nice. I did not appreciate the sunrise as well as the sunset. Perhaps there was a better location in Panglao or Alona Beach where sunsets are better appreciated.

Dog lover that I am, I noted there are few friendly dogs which I encountered there. One of them I even named Scooby Doo. The white dog with brown spots is the friendliest of them all. She is called Maggie. All of their dogs are "chubby".


Overall, Villa Angelus is still okay as a place to stay in Bohol especially considering the price as compared to a hotel. During our stay, the villa always has guests coming in replacing those who checked out. Thus it seemed to be always booked. Bring your mosquito-repellants though, for at night when you are outside your airconditioned room, mosquitoes are plenty.

This is not a sponsored review so I hope I have objectively provided a useful review for this place.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Diarrhea equals Bathroom Dance (Bad Romance Spoof)

Let's take a break from serious medical stuff. I just find this video circulating in YouTube made by famous Philippine comedian Michael V for the GMA7 TV program "Bubble Gang" entertaining. Michael V is really good at what he does including making spoofs of famous music videos and TV commercials or advertisements.

The music video is a spoof of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" entitled "Bathroom Dance" (Restroom Dance) to make it sound like Bad Romance. It is in Tagalog or Filipino but when you listen to it, it sounds similar to the original song.




For non-Filipino readers, the first part of the song translates to: "Ooooh! Makes Me Wanna Do the Bathroom Dance". (2x) Some parts of the song are translated as follows...

There it is! It's coming out! Idiot! It's getting worse...I'm like an old man.
Something happened that's frustrating. I think I ate spoiled food. I'm experiencing cramping pain...


Part of the Chorus: Biting my lips, curling in pain...that it makes me wanna do the bathroom dance...

Actually, translating Filipino to English is difficult as there are no exact English equivalents for some Tagalog or Filipino words. But from the video, one can tell what Michael V is talking about.

Seriously, one has to make sure food is freshly-cooked and freshly-prepared to avoid the "Bathroom Dance"or worse, end up in a hospital.

Food left in the open for hours even if re-heated may still result to food poisoning by multiplication of harmful organisms or by production by bacteria of toxins which are left in the food even if the organisms are eventually killed.

For now, just enjoy the video and maybe do the Bathroom Dance.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Sugat sa Paa Symposium Chong Hua Hospital Leg on July 17, 2010

Philippine Society for Vascular Surgery presents "Sugat sa Paa" Symposium on Diagnosis and Treatment this July 17, 2010 Saturday 8-5 PM at the Chong Hua Hospital.

First come. First serve. No registration fee.


  • "Hi Hello" - Recognition and Diagnosis of Foot Ulcers
  • "Sweet for Your Feet" Management of  Diabetes Mellitus
  • "Bugs that Love" DM Foot - Management of Infection
  • "Foot Loose" DM Foot Revascularization
  • "Bye Bye Foot" Amputation and Rehabilitation
Call or Text Name of Doctor to: Dr. Recuerdo Baclig - 0920-2639218

Sunday, July 4, 2010

MyHealth Multispecialty Clinic Cebu in Need of Medical Specialists

MyHealth Clinics, the latest, fastest-growing, state-of-the-art multi-specialty clinic and laboratory in the country is opening 2 clinics in Cebu (Cybergate and IT Park). They are looking for specialists especially from Rehabilitation Medicine and Dermatology. They are also looking for
  • Cardiology
  • Pulmonology
  • Gastroenterology
  • Nephrology
  • Oncology
  • Allergology
  • ENT
  • Ophthalmology
  • General Surgery
  • Urology
  • Pediatrics
  • Obstetrics-Gynecology
  • other specialties
Free rental and utilities are offered.

MyHealth Clinics is the sister company of Maxicare so most of Maxicare patients will be channeled through MyHealth Clinics physicians.

Interested doctors, please send email to Dr. Benedict Go at bgo@myhealth.ph