Friday, January 25, 2008
25 Jan Hospital appointment and shopping
This has been a very busy day and some of it must wait to be described to you tomorrow.
We were up early - my appointment at The East Surrey Hospital was at quarter past nine. Hell! Where does all that traffic come from at that time of the morning?
I was seen by Dr Hillman, Dr Foster's registrar. He really is such a nice man.
He brought up pages of figures on his screen showing just where the chemical imbalances lie at the moment.
Firstly - potassium levels are well within normal. Hooray!
But there are some problems with other chemicals and hormones. And - neither Grandpa or I can remember which ones. I do know that liver function is not as good as it should be.
So, there are problems; and yet I felt almost surprised at how seriously my condition is being regarded - and grateful too.
I will have another blood test next week and this will include having a phial taken to test aldosterone. This one was suggested to me by Paul (son of Pete and Jean, who is a clinical pathology consultant). I didn't push too hard for this - although I would have done if the potassium levels were creeping up. But Dr Hillman was very happy to go ahead with the test.
I am not sure when the results of that will come in because the blood has to be sent to a laboratory in London.
All the other results will be in when I see Mr Swinn on 5th February.
I have an appointment to see the edocrinology specialists again at the beginning of April, just a little more than 2 months.
There must be a couple more blood tests before then.
Conversation led us to tell Dr Hillman that we had invested in a home blood pressure kit - thinking he might sort of laugh at us. On the contrary, for he thought it was a very good idea. He said people don't know when they had high blood pressure - sometimes only their relatives might have an inkling after they have died. he was very pleased that Bill's problem had been discovered.
So a very satisfactory time, yet again, with the doctors of ESH.
We spent much of the rest of the morning out - and I will tell you about that tomorrow (when I have promised myself a quiet day at home).
It did involve a visit to a cafe and a look at features in a village. Quite like old times!
This afternoon the first 2 EBay parcels were posted - after a gap of over 3 months.
And then we went to Asda. We really must stop going on Fridays - it is so crowded. I am sure we have enough food to keep us going for 10 days or so and so might go on a Wednesday instead.
As before I opted for the electric buggy - and this time we had the camera with us.
This was at the start of the trip - though I had spent a while choosing some cheap hair bands (Alice bands in my day) to keep my long unruly hair better in place.
I can assure you I bought none of the tomato products to my left.
The basket is now much fuller - lots of treats for ourselves that we feel will be comparatively harmless.
I am finding that wheat is not really that harmful to me and therefore plainish biscuits are fine. The ones are I chose are called puff pastry fingers - they are shiny with sugar on the top. I haven't tried them yet.
Later I made fish pies. I had mashed potato left over from yesterday and some vegetables too; I took haddock fillets from the freezer and layered things up with a leek and onion sauce (yes - tut tut! the sauce mix was in a packet).
I made one for our meal and another to put in the freezer for another week. But it was very hard to stop Grandpa B from tucking into the second one this evening, and I had to agree it had turned out rather well.
So look out for a windmill and a pub tomorrow and maybe some trees and houses. Some people might be able to guess where we went from those words.
We were up early - my appointment at The East Surrey Hospital was at quarter past nine. Hell! Where does all that traffic come from at that time of the morning?
I was seen by Dr Hillman, Dr Foster's registrar. He really is such a nice man.
He brought up pages of figures on his screen showing just where the chemical imbalances lie at the moment.
Firstly - potassium levels are well within normal. Hooray!
But there are some problems with other chemicals and hormones. And - neither Grandpa or I can remember which ones. I do know that liver function is not as good as it should be.
So, there are problems; and yet I felt almost surprised at how seriously my condition is being regarded - and grateful too.
I will have another blood test next week and this will include having a phial taken to test aldosterone. This one was suggested to me by Paul (son of Pete and Jean, who is a clinical pathology consultant). I didn't push too hard for this - although I would have done if the potassium levels were creeping up. But Dr Hillman was very happy to go ahead with the test.
I am not sure when the results of that will come in because the blood has to be sent to a laboratory in London.
All the other results will be in when I see Mr Swinn on 5th February.
I have an appointment to see the edocrinology specialists again at the beginning of April, just a little more than 2 months.
There must be a couple more blood tests before then.
Conversation led us to tell Dr Hillman that we had invested in a home blood pressure kit - thinking he might sort of laugh at us. On the contrary, for he thought it was a very good idea. He said people don't know when they had high blood pressure - sometimes only their relatives might have an inkling after they have died. he was very pleased that Bill's problem had been discovered.
So a very satisfactory time, yet again, with the doctors of ESH.
We spent much of the rest of the morning out - and I will tell you about that tomorrow (when I have promised myself a quiet day at home).
It did involve a visit to a cafe and a look at features in a village. Quite like old times!
This afternoon the first 2 EBay parcels were posted - after a gap of over 3 months.
And then we went to Asda. We really must stop going on Fridays - it is so crowded. I am sure we have enough food to keep us going for 10 days or so and so might go on a Wednesday instead.
As before I opted for the electric buggy - and this time we had the camera with us.
This was at the start of the trip - though I had spent a while choosing some cheap hair bands (Alice bands in my day) to keep my long unruly hair better in place.
I can assure you I bought none of the tomato products to my left.
The basket is now much fuller - lots of treats for ourselves that we feel will be comparatively harmless.
I am finding that wheat is not really that harmful to me and therefore plainish biscuits are fine. The ones are I chose are called puff pastry fingers - they are shiny with sugar on the top. I haven't tried them yet.
Later I made fish pies. I had mashed potato left over from yesterday and some vegetables too; I took haddock fillets from the freezer and layered things up with a leek and onion sauce (yes - tut tut! the sauce mix was in a packet).
I made one for our meal and another to put in the freezer for another week. But it was very hard to stop Grandpa B from tucking into the second one this evening, and I had to agree it had turned out rather well.
So look out for a windmill and a pub tomorrow and maybe some trees and houses. Some people might be able to guess where we went from those words.
