Tuesday 25 September 2012

A Brave Solider Goes To Worthing Hospital All By Himself.

At any other time, in any other circumstances I'd have ridden my bicycle to Worthing but instead I'm taking the train:
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The first sign I read on arriving in Worthing is not encouraging:
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I have about two hours to kill before my appointment at 17:30 so I wander round Worthing and find myself outside a shop I used to deliver to when it was a Help The Aged charity shop:
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All gone as it the business that took the building over from HTA.

No matter how much I try to drag my feet I find myself outside the hospital an hour early:
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I wander around the perimeter to waste a bit more time and notice that the hospital has a BigMetalTower:
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Welcome to the waiting room which is to be my home for the next 3 hours:
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Eventually I am seen by a tired looking young doctor who clamps my head in a frame and conducts an examination involving very bright lights.
He decides that my problem is an inflamed optic nerve.
He wants to administer a steroid treatment and  keep me in hospital over-night but he has to consult a consultant first and I am sent back to the waiting area.

To be honest I'm not sure I want to stay in hospital over-night and begin constructing reasons (lies) why I have to get back to Bognor.
In the end I needn't have worried.
Turns out the consultant's view is that my condition may clear itself so I can go home but they want to see me again in a couple of days.

I have decided to experiment with Linda's supply of Diclofenac anti-inflammatory tablets and hope they may do the trick as I have a feeling that steroids have to be injected directly into the eyeball and I really can't seem to work up any kind of enthusiasm for that procedure.

2 comments:

Le Sanglier said...

You make me laugh. Injected directly into the eyeball... that SO makes me laugh. I am glad that the diagnosis is not "your eyeball is going to fall out so get used to it." Now, when you begin to relax and think about the past 24 hours, you begin the questioning. What made the damn nerve swell, damn it? I had Bell's Palsey in 2004 and that was the Big Question. What made the damn nerve swell, damn it? It has started swelling again, now and then. What makes the damn nerves swell, damn it?

OutaSpaceMan said...

From what I've read up to now the "directly into the eyeball' seems like a distinct possibility.

But that's no longer the disturbing aspect.
The truly disturbing fact is that optic neuritis, in certain conditions, is a presenting sign of MS.

Now there's something to occupy a mind in the early hours of the morning.