Some, I hope premature, final thoughts – THE LAST DITCH.
Having raised some concerns in the linked post, I thought I should update you, gentle readers, on my health. It took longer to see a consultant than I thought but that was my fault. I entirely forgot that my health insurance gives me online access to a GP. I went to my regular GP instead, which cost me ten days.
Once armed with a referral letter it took four days to get approval from my insurers and a further three days to get in front of a consultant. During that period, I had one further episode. I drove my sister to Rochester Cathedral last Saturday to sing choral evensong with her choir. They decided, after a wonderful performance (sacred music can be – and this was – truly beautiful) to head to a nearby pub. The resulting walk brought on a repeat of what happened on the 19th October. A doctor in the choir – Head of Medicine at a Birmingham hospital – saw what happened and said something was seriously wrong.
Two days later my cardiologist organised an ECG, echocardiogram, blood tests and a CT scan. The scan showed plaques (chalky buildups) narrowing the arteries in my heart. This seemed to account for my symptoms. I was referred to another consultant to discuss an invasive angiogram to confirm the state of my heart and – if necessary – to insert a stent. I was prescribed beta-blockers, statins and aspirin in the meantime. This all seemed clear enough. We knew the problem and had a solution.
Fate had other plans however. During a video consult on Wednesday my cardiologist reported that my blood tests had suggested clots and I reported my left leg had swelled up below the knee. He told me to adjourn immediately to A&E as it sounded like I had a clot in my leg, which could easily migrate somewhere lethal. I had planned drinks and dinner with Miss P. the Younger that evening and – when I called to cry off – she offered to come meet me at the hospital. That made for a much less stressful experience.
It proved impossible to organise the scan, so I was sent home with a dose of thinners and asked to return yesterday. I did, but my leg is so swollen that they couldn't get a definitive result. The doctor who eventually saw me said she was going to assume there was a clot and treat me accordingly. She prescribed blood thinners and said the anti-coagulation team would follow up in a few weeks. There'd then be another scan and a decision would be made on where we go from there.
I asked for copies of their test/scan results and emailed them to my two private cardiologists. The first one has called me already to take me off the aspirin he'd prescribed as that would conflict with the thinners. I expressed disappointment when he said we might have to delay the angiogram to allow the treatment for my clot to play out. I said I'd follow advice, obviously, but wanted to get on with treatment as quickly as possible. Until the clot emerged, the plan had been to fix my heart – one way or another – within two working days. That felt like a good return on my investment in health insurance to me, given that I would have had to wait in a Soviet-style queue for each of the battery of tests I had on Monday and would probably not have had a diagnosis – let alone treatment – for weeks.
He said he'd speak to his colleague who was to do the angiogram and have him call me to discuss next steps. He duly did at 6pm yesterday and was happy to proceed with the angiogram. We're aiming to do it on Monday morning though there's some doubt as the hospital he's at that day is outside my insurance coverage. We're trying to work around that.
Having read me the scary lawyer-warnings and secured my consent, we left it that I should block out Monday for treatment and expect to be home with my heart fixed by mid-afternoon.
The Last Ditch by Tom Paine 
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