Day 8 - Things are moving

Wednesday 16th September 2009

I had one hell of a night with my back. I hadn’t slept since I was admitted and I was getting no pain relief what-so-ever. I was beginning to think everyone was thinking I was making it all up and not taking any notice of me.

Even before I looked in the mirror I knew my right eye wouldn’t be a pretty sight as I could hardly open it. It wasn’t !!!

Both the lid and underneath my eye were a mass of huge white cold sore blisters. Without even seeing Kermit, I knew he would postpone the operation planned for tomorrow.

I was right. He was shocked at the state of my eye. I told him this kind of thing was normal, explained about the Eye Infirmary, and that a doctor had looked at it yesterday, and that I was waiting for some ointment. He was not a happy bunny….

He ordered one of his registrar doctors to get the consultant in charge at the Eye Infirmary A&E to page him immediately.

He then said he would postpone the operation until next Wednesday as he was concerned about the amount of infection in my system. There was a chance that if he went ahead with the operation, the cold sore infection could take a stronger hold and cause blindness in my eye.

I told him once again that I was in agony with my back. He asked what pain relief I was getting. I told him I was taking liquid morphine but that was doing nothing and that I was waiting on news from the Pain Unit. Again he wasn’t happy.

He instructed another one of his registrars to arrange an emergency MRI scan on my back as he was concerned the infection could have spread there. He then asked him to get the Pain Unit to page him urgently.

About 11.40am a porter arrived to take me down for my MRI scan. This was the first time since I arrived on the ward that I had been out of my side room. It was nice to see the ‘outside’ world for a change…

While I was waiting in the corridor to be called into the scanning room, a man carrying a case walked past me and knocked on the door of the scanning room office. I could hear my name being mentioned. The man with the case then walked towards me.
“Are you Mrs Harper”, he asked.
“Yes”, I reply.
“Hello, I’m a consultant from the Eye Infirmary. I spoke with Mr Green earlier this morning and he asked me to come over and examine your eye”.
He took out some equipment from his case, “I tried the ward and they said you were here for a MRI scan. Sorry this place isn’t ideal for an examination”, he said as he looked into my eye, “but Mr Green said it was urgent”.
He finished his examination. “There is one small blister which is on your eye but it’s nothing to worry about. I understand you are to have surgery next Wednesday”.
“Yes”, I said, “it should have been tomorrow but because of my eye, it’s been postponed”.
“It should clear up ok but just to be on the safe side I’m going to prescribe some strong antibiotic’s and some Zovirax ointment. I’m afraid you will be rattling”, he smiled, “as you need to take four tablets, four times a day for six days. The ointment is what you are normally used to”.

The consultant went into the scanning room office to arrange everything while I was taken into the MRI room. The assistant radiographer then asked me to get out of the wheelchair as it was metal and could not be taken into the room.

I explained that I would need some help as it was extremely painful to walk. He then tried to position me onto the bed and I yelled out in agony. I didn’t think he realised how much pain I was in. He called another colleague for help and so ‘Tweedle Dumb’ and ‘Tweedle Dee’ helped, but it was more like hinder, me onto the bed. Thankfully the scan only lasted 20 minutes as lying on the bed was agony.

Later that afternoon I was finally given some stronger painkillers, which had been prescribed by the Pain Unit following the telephone call from Kermit. Two slow releasing tablets were to be given at 2pm and 8pm. If I needed any more pain relief then I could have them at 2 hourly intervals.

Also arrived were the Zovirax ointment and the antibiotics prescribed by the consultant from the eye infirmary.