A first-class view of ‘klinik-chic’

The extremes of personal mobility were thrown into stark relief on Monday when I embarked on a quick trip to Switzerland to visit the doctor and grab lunch at an air show. For the past few weeks I’ve been doing my best to ignore a somewhat irritating right knee. I’m not sure what exactly set it off but I’ve my suspicions it might have been an extended run around the Imperial Palace, a lack of stretching and then a long, delicious dinner sat crossed legged on tatami mat in Omotesando. I finally had to give up running two weeks ago in a hope that it would calm down but unfortunately the pain didn’t let up.

Last Friday I gave my doctor a ring in Switzerland and asked him if he could do an over-the-phone diagnosis. Trusty Dr Georg asked me to poke and press around my knee as I sat at my desk clenching the phone between my ear and my left shoulder. He then asked me to extend my leg, do a few bends and fired a couple of questions at me about recent activity. Finally he suggested that a phone diagnosis probably wasn’t the best path to recovery and asked if I could fly to St Moritz or Zürich for an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scan.

“I have to be in Geneva for lunch on Tuesday, so Tuesday morning could work,” I ventured.

“I’ll have my colleagues get in touch and see what we can line up,” replied Herr Doktor.

Thirty minutes later I received a confirmation that they’d be expecting me at the Hirslanden Klinik in Zürich at 7.45 on Tuesday morning and I’d have my results later that day.

Of course, it’s the law of the injured that my Monday afternoon flight was parked at the farthest gate at Heathrow’s Terminal One and I did my best to not adopt a limp while shuffling to the gate. The following morning I woke early, enjoyed a hearty breakfast at the Hotel Rössli and made an effort to get to the klinik a little earlier than I normally would. Having spent a fair bit of time in hospitals on various continents I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m mildly fascinated by Swiss medical staff and their choice of footwear.

I took my front row seat in the radiology unit and watched interns, nurses, technicians and doctors glide past in their weird and wonderful shoes. I wondered whether there was a hierarchy that went with wearing a pair of white leather wedges with big plastic buckles versus a pair of white Birkenstocks with a closed, slightly baked-potato-shaped toe. The Swiss might not win any awards for their keen fashion sense but they’ve become masters of a particular style of klinik-chic that hospitals in other countries might want to follow. Perhaps the best ensemble spotted was on a tanned junior doctor who sported trim white cargo-style trousers with plenty of pockets for scissors, flashlights and essential medical tools. He had obviously made considerable effort to roll them just above the ankle in order to flash a bit of leg above the oatmeal coloured hiking socks that peeked out through his white, open toe, double strap Birkenstocks. On top he wore a fitted, white piqué polo shirt, stethoscope and lab coat draped cape style over his shoulders.

By 8.10 the MRI was complete. I told the staff I really didn’t need to take the bulky scans with me but they insisted, so I tried to find an elegant way to stuff them in my bag.

Three hours later in Geneva my knee was acting up in protest as I marched through the exhibition hall at the EBACE business aircraft expo.

As much as a private aircraft would make this column move that little bit faster, there wasn’t much that caught my eye in the main trade hall. Eurocopter’s stand featuring their collaboration with Mercedes seemed to have quite a few Brazilians lined-up to try out the cabin on one of their specially customised models; Boeing and Airbus were pushing their next wide-bodies in special VIP configurations. And the models of fighter aircraft mixed with Falcon jets on the Dassault stand looked oddly out of step in an otherwise “non lethal” environment. I did manage to pause briefly to look at my favourite run-about, the Pilatus PC-12, and also stopped to look at a model of the new HondaJet that has a certain manga-style cuteness about it.

After lunch I wandered out on to the tarmac with a fellow Canadian to look at her company’s latest offer for serious, seamless global mobility. Decked out in a VistaJet livery, Bombardier’s newly-badged Global Express model was all thick pile carpets and tasteful cabinetry and my knee suddenly started feeling much better. I had to gently remind it that it shouldn’t get too comfortable as it wasn’t going to be flying back to London by private jet and was soon going to be wedged into what’s supposed to pass for business class on Swiss.

On touchdown at Heathrow the phone rang and Doktor Georg told me I shouldn’t get too comfortable in London as I’d done a good job tearing my meniscus and I needed to book in for two weeks. More on Swiss hospital attire soon.

Tyler Brûlé is editor-in-chief of Monocle magazine

tyler.brule@ft.com

More columns at www.ft.com/brule