Ok so just started my treatment of 33 sessions of radiotherapy on Wednesday last week, all was going well enough with getting into the bladder/bowel routine (it’s like Groundhog Day each morning really)
However I started feeling unwell on Sunday evening, tickly irritating cough, which became worse and worse as the day went on. I went to my session on Monday feeling terrible and spent the rest of the day sleeping or trying to sleep as my condition worsened. Never known exhaustion like it and I also developed a really painful cough and a force 10 level headache that was the worst symptom.
Eventually at 2am I had to wake my wife to take me to A&E - which was fortunately very quiet, but by this time the headache was completely unbearable, I thought it was going to explode or I’d have a stroke or something as my blood pressure was high - so was temperature and pulse was racing.
I had a battery of blood tests, chest x-ray and neurological testing and was diagnosed with a rather nasty bacterial chest infection at the root of it all. Put on IV antibiotics and IV fluids and kept under observation because of the blinding headache which remained - in spite of some strong dyhydrocodeine painkillers.
Eventually around 4pm as I became more rehydrated and was also able to drink water without being sick (as I was earlier) the headache started to diminish slowly and I began feeling much better, has a small dinner and was given a sleeping pill at 11:30pm - slept like a baby for 6 hours, it was bliss
So here I am this morning, chest still very sore and productive but not feeling as acutely painful as yesterday, and I have to say, In the brand new ultra modern Queen Elizatheth University Hospital
I have been treated absolutely wonderfully by the entire team of staff I have met
Back to PC treatment though, obviously missed Tuesdays session, will miss a few more this week but the radiographers have said that they will just add more sessions at the end. It seems that hormone therapy and radiotherapy can weaken the immune system and make patients vulnerable to these kind of infections
Bloody awful bug though but the corner has definitely turned and it is lovely to feel so well looked after. The NHS gets a lot of stick but the people struggling to do a good job in difficult financial, organisational and political restraints deserve medals - and more pay and better working conditions
Edited by member 14 Feb 2018 at 09:10
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