Hi,
I'm overwhelmed by the messages you have all posted. Thank you.
Sorry I haven't posted since this morning but I felt really tired following the angioplasty and trying to post, left handed, proved quite difficult. I'm very much a right handed person so I'm finding having to avoid any use of my right arm, a bit difficult (this is because during the procedure, your right wrist is cut and you have to give it chance to heal, keeping it straight for 24 hours, no heavy lifting for a week). I actually spent most of the day resting but not really being able to sleep much (which is what I really needed after a fairly sleepless night). I did keep checking on your messages though which helped a lot, as no visitors were allowed on the ward.
I was allowed home just before 5pm and went straight to bed until now. I must try and get back into normal sleep patterns.
Well, the angioplasty went well in unblocking the left coronary artery as planned. When it came to expanding the artery to put the metal stent in, I found it quiet painful this time, but that part barely lasted a couple of minutes. It's a procedure which I would happily do again if it was found to be necessary.
When I was reviewed by my consultant, he felt things had gone well but on later examination of the pictures, found that I had another problem with my heart which hadn't been detected before. He said that it appeared that part of the wall of one of my coronary arteries is thinner than it should be, so he is going to have to keep me on certain drugs longer than he expected to do (including one that doesn't allow you to drink alcohol, sob!). He also said he would do another angiogram in about a year and following that, may need to give me another operation to sort that out. Not sure what that would involve, I'll have to read up about it.
Apart from that, he said that I should make a good recovery and was quite happy that after a suitable rest, I could start running again. Unfortunately, not in time for me to run the Reading Half Marathon in March as I'd planned to.
I phoned my cardiac rehab nurse a few hours after the op and she was so relieved it had gone well. She said she had been quite concerned about my condition leading up to this point. She said she would have been sorry to "loose" me before she had chance to torture me with her exercise sessions. She told me she has already booked me in for her rehab fitness sessions starting on Tuesday, 3rd Feb. I'm looking forward to it. At least I can get fit while being closely monitored. She has really helped me get through this.
It's a shame to say this but I could have done with the same support from my uro oncology support nurses. I know they must be very busy but it's noticeable how much more supportive the cardiac care team are than the cancer team. I suppose it was probably that my heart problem was considered to more life threatening than my cancer at this stage. It could be a matter of funding and staffing levels too. The cardiac team have actually won an award for being the best centre in the country which I would fully agree with.
Well I feel much happier that particular heart problem is out of the way. I now have a sigmoidoscopy (look it up) to look forward to, a week on Friday (the 30th), having been finally referred by my oncologist to investigate possible radiotherapy damage. It's all good fun.
My 60th. birthday gift from the NHS was a screening test for possible bowel cancer, received in the post earlier this month thought when I have the sigmoidoscopy, it may not be necessary to do the test sent to me as that will have a better chance of detecting any possible cancer.
Anyway, thanks again for the support you have shown me, I hope I'm able to the same for others.
"Today is the First Day of the Rest of my Life".
Steve
Edited by member 20 Jan 2015 at 03:08
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