Today I finally went to the specialist. He had an excitingly vowel-free Polish name and I was expecting a 40-something energetic young man with a nice strong accent. Instead I got an extremely steady and low key man of about my age with a home counties accent who is probably a product of one of our Catholic grammar schools, to which all bright Polish boys went without exception. Or maybe he went to one of the private schools if his parents were more affluent. I almost thought I knew him from somewhere. He was steady and quiet which prevented me making jokes.
Before I went in I was weighed and had my blood pressure taken. The nurse who did this was far from young, again, about my age. I suppose it is a product of getting older, you really start to notice people like you, who would once have been retired, now still at the coal-face. My blood pressure was good 122/72 - much better than last time. I expect my weight loss has helped. There was another, younger, blond nurse, everyone was very friendly, and it was terribly quiet. This part of outpatients is called Area B which sounds nicely science fictional, you enter Area B and there is nothing but a sea of blue seats, with one person sitting at the far end.
The gastroenterologist asked me if I had had developed any new symptoms. I told him about the chest pains, but forgot to tell him about the shakes and lightheadedness. He ordered an MRI scan, and more blood tests. He told me he thought a stone was stuck in the bile duct and that was why it was grumbling all the time, if so, while annoying, it is very reassuring. If this is correct they will send down a camera and remove the stone, subsequently, if necessary, they will remove the gall bladder. Joy. There is some concern about my liver, which is fatty "because you are fat" but is behaving badly probably because it is being affected by the gallstone situation.
I took my blood test form down the passage. My veins were playing up, and it was touch and go, even with the butterfly on the back of my hand. Sometimes it has come out so slowly that it has coagulated before the sample pots are filled. This time there was a new sample pot, with a brown lid, as well as the more familiar purple lid (the other familiar ones are yellow and green). I vaguely associate brown with the liver - the meat, liver spots etc. liver-spotted dalmatians. But perhaps it's nothing to do with that.
The sun went in and cloud came over. We went home. What next?
Before I went in I was weighed and had my blood pressure taken. The nurse who did this was far from young, again, about my age. I suppose it is a product of getting older, you really start to notice people like you, who would once have been retired, now still at the coal-face. My blood pressure was good 122/72 - much better than last time. I expect my weight loss has helped. There was another, younger, blond nurse, everyone was very friendly, and it was terribly quiet. This part of outpatients is called Area B which sounds nicely science fictional, you enter Area B and there is nothing but a sea of blue seats, with one person sitting at the far end.
The gastroenterologist asked me if I had had developed any new symptoms. I told him about the chest pains, but forgot to tell him about the shakes and lightheadedness. He ordered an MRI scan, and more blood tests. He told me he thought a stone was stuck in the bile duct and that was why it was grumbling all the time, if so, while annoying, it is very reassuring. If this is correct they will send down a camera and remove the stone, subsequently, if necessary, they will remove the gall bladder. Joy. There is some concern about my liver, which is fatty "because you are fat" but is behaving badly probably because it is being affected by the gallstone situation.
I took my blood test form down the passage. My veins were playing up, and it was touch and go, even with the butterfly on the back of my hand. Sometimes it has come out so slowly that it has coagulated before the sample pots are filled. This time there was a new sample pot, with a brown lid, as well as the more familiar purple lid (the other familiar ones are yellow and green). I vaguely associate brown with the liver - the meat, liver spots etc. liver-spotted dalmatians. But perhaps it's nothing to do with that.
The sun went in and cloud came over. We went home. What next?
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