h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The being ill bit is kinda terrible, well life-threatening, at the worse, and all intermediates under that of awefullness too,
But, its the administration that makes it truly terrible...

11 AM Thursday, at gym, fine, training a client...

11.45, urgent trip for me to loo.... Diarrhea... oh
11.55, pop more than a days worth of prednisolone (on top of the normal morning amount I had before attending gym.
Come home... more diarrhea Oh,
Take more prednisolone.... repeat, for most of the day; But, not actually feeling too terrible...
Cooked W and I lunch, which we had (took more prednisolone)

By early evening, not feeling too aweful.
Had a shower... feeling quite OK....
vomited.
ahh.
midnight arrived at hospital by ambelence.
paramedics had taken all my details; including complete medical history, and full account of the days happenings etc.

Ambelence crew do 'handover and debrief' to hospital A&E staff.

Who clearly didn't write any of it down.

Spend three hours repeating the same information again and again and again and again, to every single person in A&E.

Eventually someone reads a book, and finds the word 'Addisons' (OK; by this point I'll run with that; I specifically had pointed out to them numerous times, I have secondary adrenal insufficiency, not primary, Addison's, but, it was progress).
I get an emergency shoot of hydrocortisone (to join the one ambelence crew gave me), and someone has the brain-wave to give me a electrolyte IV drip. - promptly forgetting they've put me in a A&E bay, fourteen mimles from the nearest toilet; and teathered me to the bed via a vein, cannular, piece of tubing and bag of drip fluids.

Spend until midday the next day, constantly pressing buzzer, making W run to find staff, and have the drip disattached, and reattached, whilst I make ten million trips to the loo (at least four an hour).

There were no beds, at all in the hospital. so I remained in A&E, freezing cold, starving hundry and with nothing to drink, from midnight, until just after midday Friday.

Midday Friday, told I'm going to ward C5.
Then get taken to ward N (the isolation ward, new, and single room).

At least I was put into a separate room, with own toilet, as I then spent most of my time visiting the toilet, of course.

A&E, unable to pass any details to the ward, so I get to repeat everything again; including telling them all about my medical conditions, treatments, and medication; all of which have occurred at this hospital; all of which are, therefore, on their computer system.



Didn't sleep last night.
Didn't sleep Thursday night, in A&E.

Didn't sleep Wednesday night, before getting ill (probably not a coincidence).
Still not slept.
I think I've been awake now, over 84 hours.

But I am home now!

Mind, I could have been home... a lot... an aweful lot... earlier.

I was discharged this morning, at 10 AM.
It took them until 5 PM tonight, to realise I was discharged, and do something about it. - and only managed to get discharged by luckily finding one nurse, who understood spoken English, and as she had seen me in hospital before, knew I was talking sense; one reason I wasn't discharged earlier; we were waiting 'for meds', specifically for prednisolone; which wouldn't be available until Sunday or Monday; I had told them. again. and again; I've over 500 MG of tablets in my fridge, at home; even at the top end high dose I'm on tempory, of 50 MG a day, that will last longer than necessary (plus I'm tapering after a couple days on that high dose).

We escaped, but I've a strange feeling, someone, as we left, said they'd

'Post you a prescription you can use at your local pharmacy, as as they are ordered already, send the prednisolone ordered from hospital pharmacy).

- I'll need a bigger fridge

DX, is probably gastroenteritis viral infection, as various tests revealed nothing else,, Heart was fine, Kidneys are still holding up well, and my temp, HR and BP had returned well to normal by the end of yesterday; were even better today; and something I've not had before: I got 100% out of 100% every time they measured my oxygen saturation!- I assume that is good...

X-ray of lungs was fine, so not an infection there, urine clear, blood clear, etc

But. I really must do what I've been meaning to do for ages; pre-prepare a 'hospital bag', - essentials, for washing, brushing hair, teeth, etc, and a couple days clothing, plus spare charger's for electronic devices, etc - sadly this time I was out of range in the room I was in, to get any signal from the mobile networks

Death, foiled once more.

Playing safe, not going to the pub tonight

Just showered, which feels really rather good

I hope no American conservatives get ahold of your journal. They'd use it as an example of how bad they think socialized medicine can be.

Its nothing to do with the medicine... that's the really* annoying thing - just years of underinvestment, and no working IT systems to be founhd anywhere in the entire healthcare system - plus the recruitment problems in the NHS, I get the feeling they've lowered the language propheciency requirments for nurses etc, and the language barrier is very problematic at times - Well, another problem, the shortage of beds, is, clearly at least partly due to the naff-all administration; I could have left the hospital at 10.30 AM, not 6 PM, if someone, had acted on the Drs request to discharge me; and if the language barrier with nurses, ment they weren't frantically trying to find meds to give me, which I didn't need as I've a shed-load at home...

And... then bits of the system work; yesterday, got a phone call... [Personal details removed by Moderator] gave directions, and a private corior hands me a parcel of meds, plus my discharge letter from hospital on a Sunday Now I definitely have a shed-load of steroids

So tired... I seem to be able to sleep until about 5.30 AM, before needing the loo first - I can't go to sleep before 1 AM, as... well I just can't, so having gone about 90 hours no sleep at all, I'm topping that up with massive four hour sleeps

Today is day five since symptoms began... assuing an average 7 day run of a viral infection, I oughta see things improve soon, as I guess the virus was incubating in me a day or more before I got symptomatic But I doubt I'll make it to the pub tonight - hoping I can by the end of the week, as its my birthday! plus I'm due in hospital Friday for a testosterone blood test and electrolyte measurements - now phoning hospital depts. I'm involved with; to try ensure they get the information to themn that I was in hospital; endocrinology need to know, obviously, and maybe cardiology oughta know, as my heart rate and BP did all kinds of mental dan ing tricks as I went into crisis... spper super low BP and super high HR being the main one

Just so tired... and starving hungry

Wow Definitely sounds like you had a dose of something like norovirus A87917827 there... Not good (to say the least) on top of everything else you're dealing with...

I hope the hangover from the extra meds isn't too bad for you, and it is good to hear that you're recovering well from the virus - not surprised you're hungry after all that lot...

Yep, best guess of everyone concerned is novovirus...

I've run out of gastrointestinal muscle stamina at this stage the cramping... is... novel

Today is the seventh day of multiple per hour (four or five normally) trips to the loo not that there is much to expell anymore - The scales showed I'd lost about 2 KG two days after I got to hospital, and that was despite eating at that stage... Weighed myself this morning, and I've lost even more - despite eating useual, or more than useual calories

Took a attacking defence last night... and went for a short walk, including two pints of beer on the way home... I think it helped more than it made thigs worse

drinking lots to try stay hydrated, but cautious of course, that end of September I was in hospital nearly in a coma with low sodium//hyponatremea, from drinking too much fluid/water - how the eck I balance the advice to 'not over drink', Re the hyponatremea, with the 'drink plenty' advice, re diorrhea

Given this is day seven... I really oughta see things imnprove soon... I hope

Doubt I'll be up to much this weekend for my birthday and BoB knows when I'll next get back to the gym; even the short walk last night left my legs aching and I can see muscle definition already vanishing fast - the weight loss is a bonus though

Going to start some oral rehydration solution today, as I'm not happy I'm holding on to electrolytes very well, so that seems sensible a thing to me

The main problem with the high dose steroids; I'm on 12 MG prednisolone a day, and my useual dose is 4 MG a day; to reduce I have to do it gradually; no more than 1 MG at a time, and sit at that dose for a couple days before reducing another 1 MG... at that rate, it'll be well into the new year I guess before I'm feeling remotely un-corpse, and the dizzyness, out of body-ness, nad floating in treacle has subsided to its useual level of out of bodyness

In the meantimes I can't get to hospital for my mid-point testosterone test and I'm so bored can't read, can't listen to music, can't go out... nothing left to do really... and of course stil can't sleep due to steroids; got about two hours last night