Ailments, Aches & Pains. (Let's hear them here)


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Went to the Doc's last week for 'bloods', because they can't be done by turning up at the hospital these days.

While there, the nurse took my BP, almost before I'd had chance to sit down.

Later she told me it was 'a bit high'. ( 153/95) She recommended getting a 'monitor', so I can keep an eye on it.

 

So anyway..I've been thinking of getting one anyway and I bought a Braun model for about £70.

 

So far I'm getting readings of around 125/80 (Average) in the mornings, and 109/65 or lower in the evening.

 

Seems decent enough to me.

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Kind of..  Docs don't bother me.. but getting to appointments does....

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Raising B.P. when seeing the doctor is known as, "White coat syndrome", is a real thing. My wife has suffered it for years. It is written on her records, so taken into consideration when she visits the surgery. In fact, she went to see our GP last Friday and I've been asked to take Tina's BP over this week. Do it 3 times and note the lowest each day. I can guarantee, as soon as she sees the pouch that I keep the monitor in, her BP will go up. She panics just looking at it. I have two types of monitor, a manual (with the pump up bulb) and an automatic one where you just press a button, (battery-powered).

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I've was picked up as having high blood pressure several years ago. I was prescribed tablets which fixed the problem and I've never been high again since.

 

It's never been suggested I have any kind of monitor; I just go to my GP once a year for a check-up. and they tell me the figure has stayed reasonable. The tablets seem to work, and I don't vary.

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I to was picked up with high blood pressure and again when at the surgery it was always high. I purchased a monitor and check it for a week before and record it , its is always OK, when I go to have it taken by them it is always high, I just dont like the doctors surgery.

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It's known as white coat hypertension and even those who claim that medics don't faze them seem susceptible to it.

 

I've had a monitor for years. My BP is always on the low side and is usually normal if taken in a medical setting.  I was once late for a medication review, ran across the car park and into the surgery. The doc put the cuff on immediately and said my BP was a bit high. I insisted he do it again after I'd done five minutes of meditation breathing. It was way down. He looked shocked but it shut him up!

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I reckon tonight's experience sort of proves it.  I  ran two tests this morning, before any coffee etc.  just after getting up and sitting  a chair for a few minutes.

 

I got:  126/80.

 

This evening I forgot until I'd just staggered down the stairs after going up to clean my teeth  and take some washing back up.  Remembered and got the machine out, set it up and tried to be still but got 142/77.

So... sat still..quietly asked Alexa to time three minutes,  then tried again and got 122/77.

 

Just goes to show that you can control your own BP to some extent by relaxation and 'mindfulness'.

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We also have a BP monitor its a Beurer and at the moment is used fairly frequently. My husband has high BP and high glicemic count. Both now under control.

I had a frightening experience once when I went to have chemo. I had rushed for the appointment then couldnt find a parking space at the hospital. Consequently arriving in oncology I was a bit anxious. They told me to sit for a while and then took my BP still high so they gave me a tablet and had to sit for a while. Took it again and still high and at the finish I couldn't do the chemo so was sent home. Had to go back the following week. That was the reason I bought a monitor, so after that I leave in plenty of time in case I have to wait for a parking space. Big hospital with little space outside for cars. I don't like going underground to park, I can never find my car when I return to it.

They are useful things and we were told not to take the first reading for granted. Same with Glicemia the dr told my husband not to take readings always at the same time. Take them at various times and record them. Thats what hes doing and I no longer hear " its high".

Hope everything goes well for you DJ

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Thanks Nonna,

My Doc was very pleased with my week's worth of BP recordings which averaged out at below 130/80.  He also said he was not concerned by any of my bloods results.  Which was nice.

 

On the downside, I went for a second 'Pre Op' today for my proposed knee surgery. They repeated all the basics such as  swabbing for MRSA etc, just to extend the 'window'  for my surgery, but the main reason for the appointment was for me to meet the Consultant Anaesthetist.

 

Long story short, he has referred me to Wrightington's own Cardiologist as well as requesting more info from my own Cardio folks.  This because, as he explained..  If I was a normal 'fit and healthy person', my risk of dying from the knee op would be about 0.01%, but given his understanding of my condition, he reckons that goes up to 11.1% :ohmy:.  That is a level of risk which had me sitting back, although he told me he had the strong impression I still want the surgery.

 

I do, because my life is basically on hold at the moment,  all activity is painful  and the resulting inactivity is bad for my general health which puts me in a sort of downward spiral.

He also explained that the drug used for sedation during the op.. (Propofol....the one which killed Michael Jackson..)  lowers BP, putting the heart under stress.  As well as being a risk in itself, this also points to them using as little as possible..which means I may have to 'bite the bullet' and deal with being more conscious than I would like during surgery.

However.. he also pointed out that the risk doesn't stop when the surgery stops, and the heart remains under 'duress' during recovery, for some days.  Lovely.

 

Also, though it wasn't mentioned to me, I heard a nurse telling another 'punter', that all elective surgery has been suspended until at least the end of January.  This is because Wrightington..a specialist Orthopaedic Hospital, is currently full of general medical patients from other hospitals which are full of Covid patients.  That's fair enough to me because my knee problems are not immediately life threatening.. though I am very pee'd off at anyone who is in hospital because they are too stupid to get vaccinated.

 

And finally, I mentioned to the Anaesthetist that I have been told not to hesitate to use Diazepam (Valium)  on the day of my surgery. He agreed, and although my normal dose for getting on top of anxiety which gets past my 'self talk' etc.. is 1.25 mg, ..he recommended I use 5mg the night before and another 5 mg in the morning.  He hinted that up to 10 mg would be OK, and that it doesn't lower BP...

I think I can see where he is coming from.....

 

Anyway..we shall see.

 

 

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What an ‘interesting’ pre-op appointment, Col.   I like a doctor who gives people the facts and doesn’t  waffle his/her way through ‘difficult’  information.

I hope your op will be as soon as possible so you’ll be able to resume a more active, pain free life x

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For the past couple of weeks we’ve been staying in our shed in Dorset and friends from Nottingham came to stay last Wednesday.  He’d had chest/upper abdomen pains on Tuesday night and drove to his GP surgery the next morning to get checked out.  He imagined he’d got bad indigestion but he had an ECG which was fine and bloods taken.  They then set off to Dorset.  At 10.30 that evening he had a call on his mobile phone, it was an on-call doctor who instructed him to ring 999 immediately and get to hospital.  Apparently his Troponin levels indicated that he’d had a heart attack.  Normal level should be less than 0.4 and his was 460!  No ambulance was available and a taxi was sent by NHS to collect him.  His wife went with him, they sat in Poole A&E for 14 hours before a bed was found for him.  He had a couple of days in there and then was taken to Bournemouth Hospital, which is a specialist Heart hospital.  He’s still there, while the docs decide how to treat him.  He has nothing but praise for the NHS.  Oh, he’s 91 years young btw!  Unfortunately we’ve  had to come back to Nottingham for a funeral tomorrow so his wife is down there on her own but she’s very capable of looking after herself, drives and is much younger than her husband.  

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Please Miss, can I have a shed like wot you got? Ha ha. Sorry to hear of your friend's health woes, hope he gets sorted soon, and back home.

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@LizzieM Sorry to read about your friend.  I hope the doctors will

soon come up with a proposed treatment for him.  
I presume you’ll be going back down South after the Nottingham funeral so that 

you can support your friends.

Thinking of you ….. x

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Thanks for your concern @katyjayand @MargieH My friend was visiting her husband this afternoon so we might know what’s happening with him later on.  Hopefully a stent or two will sort him out.
In other news …….. we missed some of the funeral this afternoon.  We’d been ready and sitting around at home waiting to leave in plenty of time for a 2.30 Service at Wilford Hill.  At 1.30 my cousin rang to see if we were close by.  I said we were still at home as it was another hour before we had to be there.  He said no, the service is about to start,  at 1.30!   We dashed to the car and I rang our two sons who were travelling up from Hertfordshire.  They were at J21 of the M1.  I rang my brother who was just about to leave home in Arnold.  I’d told them all that the funeral was at 2.30.  The boys turned round and went back south and my brother didn’t bother leaving home.  The service was delayed 15 mins but my husband was moaning away at me all the way to the Crem.  We only missed about 10 mins.  As we all trouped out of the chapel my cousin admitted that he’d given me the wrong time, pressed the 2 instead of 1 on his phone.  That’s possibly the last time we cousins will all get together, my aunt was the last of that generation to pass away.  Very sad.  

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Pleased you didn’t miss too much of the funeral but it was sad that your boys and your brother didn’t make it to the service .  Sometimes it’s only at funerals that you can meet up with cousins and other relatives all together.  
I hope your friend with the heart problem will have it resolved by stents - it all depends on where the blockage/ narrowing is.   Because Paul’s was a problem in a main coronary artery, he was told that stents wouldn’t be suitable so he had to have a double bypass!   That was a bit of a shock when the consultant told us but he was (and is) fine.  That was 14 years ago this year!

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We’re of course hoping it’s only stents, especially as we’re going back down for the weekend and have booked a table for the 4 of us at a particularly good restaurant.  

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22 hours ago, LizzieM said:

He’d had chest/upper abdomen pains on Tuesday night and drove to his GP surgery the next morning to get checked out.  

We have had a similar occurrence but with a more devastating ending.

We are friendly with most in our road but there's only one couple that we really socialised with ,  just having a coffee and cake occasionally at each others house.

Peter had just finished successful radiotherapy before Christmas for prostate .

Since Christmas he'd mentioned that he was getting breathless when walking any distance.  (This was a couple who during early lockdown had been walking 10 miles a day. )

 

Middle of last week he more or less collapsed on the pavement and was helped home by a passing van driver.

After looking on the net , he diagnosed himself with angina and rung the doctors for an appointment . He got a telephone diagnosis first from the doc who prescribed some pills . 

Last Thursday morning ,  his wife rung ,  excited , to say he'd got an actual physical appointment to see the doctor on Friday . Not easy to get in our town. 

He was cleaning his car,  Thurs afternoon when we drove by their house . We chatted a short while before driving on. They'd just ordered a new car and he was cleaning up the old one ready to trade in .

 

Then 9.30pm Thursday night our phone rings and female voice says " I'm a paramedic can you come and sit with Alice , I'm afraid Peter's passed away suddenly".

 

We rushed up there and obviously she was in bits . 

There were three paramedics who had been working on Pete for 40 minutes but couldn't bring him round.

 

He'd first started with pains in his chest about 7pm and his wife called the ambulance but whilst waiting he'd perked up and told her to cancel the ambulance . Which unfortunately she did.

 

He went upstairs to lay down ,  went to the bathroom then collapsed on the landing on his way back to bed.

Ambulance called again and two turned up but to no avail. 

 

We stayed with her until funeral services came to take him away about 11.30pm. The three paramedics remained there the whole time . They also rang her sons who both live 200 miles away to give the bad news.

Another neighbour came around to stay with her through the night. 

My wife went round to be with her during Friday until the first of her sons arrived in the afternoon.

At least now she has some relatives with her but such a shock . 

 

 

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Missed all three of my brothers funerals, because no bugger bothered to let me know they had died. Never able to say goodbye.

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@DAVIDW what a shock for Alice but so good that you and your wife were able to support her for part of the time until her sons arrived.  It must have been a shock for you as well.   Take care…

@Beekay. I feel sad for you that you weren’t able to say goodbye to your brothers…. I seem to

remember your writing on here about one of them who died in Nottingham? x

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Hi Margie, in reply, my eldest and youngest brothers both died in Nottingham. My other brother, who was next down from me, he died on the Isle of Man.

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My sympathies and condolences to all concerned.

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