The appointment

Well I think this was the worst appointment I have ever had. I was seen by yet another doctor, so further of the no continuity, but also, he was useless.
He spent the first 10mins bumbling around with the notes so didn't listen to anything I had to say. Seeing as I had some new pertinent points to make this time, like the blood when I went to the toilet, it might have been handy for him to listen!!
Anyway, once we got through that and I had repeated myself 3 times, we started talking about my heart. I asked what follow up should be happening given when I left hospital I was meant to have echo cardiographs every 3 weeks to keep an eye on things and I had only had one!! He asked why would I need to have it checked!!!!!!! I nearly fell off my chair. Clearly what he had read in the notes either hadn't sunk in or he just didn't read anything about my heart. Not to mention the "cardiac event" I had just before Christmas.
Finally, he came across the results of the echocardiograph I had at the end of September. Oh, he said, oh we need to do something about this. Apparently, the results are pretty bad.......I only have 19% usage of my heart. I have severe systolic left ventricular dysfunction, moderate diastolic left ventricular dysfunction and there is some collapsing of the right side of my heart. So all in all, it's not good, and plenty of reason for me to be having regular check-ups.
I found it rather amusing how he went from questioning me as to why on earth I should be having another echo to writing me a referral with some urgency. Amazing what happens when you know a bit more about your patient isn't it!
Anyway, I am a little disappointed that they had that information and no-one has followed up with me. At what point does someone go, this is pretty severe heart issues should we get her to see a cardiologist? Apparently not......it jut gets filed and someday when the patient asks about it we will pull it out and be surprised we have done nothing.
So that was the heart....next was the chemo.
No chemo for another 2 weeks. He doesn't know what the infection is, but can't take the risk of me starting chemo and getting REALLY sick. I am getting a bit worried about leaving it so long now. I keep thinking it's an opening for the cancer to take hold again. I guess the CT scan next week will gie us a very good indication of where it's at rigt now.
He gave me another round of antibiotics, which I won't take knowing what that does to my guts, (makes them more sick), and suggested I see my gastroenterologist to get them to say that it's a flare up of the ulcerative colitis causing the high white blood count, the bleeding and the pains in the tummy.
I suppose at least the lack of heart function explains why I get so tired so quickly.
Anyway, that's it for today.........until next time.xxx

NEVER, NEVER, NEVER GIVE UP!