Last week was not a week I’d like to relive.

I spent three days in bed sick with what I thought was a sinus infection that just wouldn’t quit and was resistant to antibiotics. But, as I dozed in and out of feverish headaches, body aches and chills, declining any food, one thought broke through the veil of thick-coated sickness.

It’s the flu.

It seems many people in Syosset are sick with varying degrees of illness from the symptoms of fevers, chills and coughing to vomiting. Maybe it’s the cold and snow keeping us locked up in such close quarters where germs incubate and spread faster than rabbits reproduce. Maybe it’s just flu season.

I’ve only gotten a flu shot once in my life during a visit in my doctor’s office almost nine years ago when my children were all very young. As a stay-at-home mom, I felt I had no choice but to be at my healthiest.  Who would take care of me while I needed to take care of them?  But, in my thirties at that time, it didn’t seem to make any real difference in staving off incapacitating sicknesses - or did it?

According to their website, the Centers For Disease Control (CDC) recommendations for the 2011 flu season that anyone six months and up should get vaccinated.  The CDC also recommends a more heavy-duty rapid flu treatment with antiviral drugs for people at high risk of serious flu complications; meaning, the young and the elderly.

Most doctors agree that it isn’t necessary except for babies and septuagenarians, but many workers in health care or the public sector must get a flu shot.  Remember the issue last season when state workers were mandated to get the H1N1 flu shot? 

And, yikes, after what we went through last week, I’m sold.  Anything to help alleviate that misery. My parents, Syosset residents in their 70's, have been getting flu shots for years from their long-time doctors. 

But, as my mom said, “now we just go to CVS.”

You can either call for an appointment or just walk-in to their Minute Clinic and get a flu shot in Syosset:  CVS (1-866-389-2727) charges $29.95.  Rite Aid (516) 921-2811 is $24.99. This is if you don’t have insurance, otherwise the price will vary under your insurance policy.  If over age 65, there’s Medicare.

The CVS website says the flu shot can reduce your risk of getting the flu by up to 70%.  CVS offers an all-in-one flu shot that protects against three flu strains: H3H2, Regular Seasonal A H1N1 and Regular Seasonal B Virus. 

Washing your hands supposedly helps curtail the spread of germs, too. Of course, that’s all preventative. If you get sick and can’t get a doctors’s appointment, you can also find Physicians’ Assistants or Nurse Practitioners right here in Syosset in various facilities that can help.

I was amazed that the CVS pharmacy’s Minute Clinic, located on Cold Spring Road, http://www.minuteclinic.com/flu/  is open daily from 8:00 am to 7:30 pm or Saturdays 9:00 am to 5:30 pm and Sundays 10 am to 5:30 pm.

A pharmacist at Rite Aid off Jackson Avenue explained that shots are given on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 2:00 to 9 pm.  If your child is sick and the pediatrician is closed, the original PM Pediatrics located in Syosset offers after-hours urgent care up to age 21. 

PM Pediatrics provides most emergency room procedures (no cat-scans. just: x-rays) but administers splints, crutches, simple sutures, with registered nurses, physicians assistants, medical assistants, x-ray techs, a plastic surgeon and three to six doctors on the premises. 

PM Pediatrics can deal with just about anything from basic sore throats, ear aches nebulizers for asthma attacks to hooking up IV lines to re-hydrate patients.  They take most insurance.  Check out www.pmpediatrics.com located at 596 Jericho Turnpike or call them at 516-677-5437.

Meanwhile, wash your hands and drink plenty of fluids and stay well.