Monday 14.7.25 to Tuesday 15.7.25
As noted in my previous entry, on Monday evening my temperature was above 38C on all three of our thermometers. I felt fine. So I wasn't enthusiastic about going, but everyone had said if your temp goes over 38C then you need to go to hospital. So we went.
Stu drove me to the hospital and we arrived maybe around 19:30.
I had to wait for one person in front of me to see the triage nurse. Eventually I got seen and told them my story. She made a phone call at one point to decide if I should be grade 2 or 3. In the end they decided I should be grade 2, so I went straight in which was nice!
I got taken to a curtained booth and they set me up in a bed.
First up they were either trying to get blood or trying to put a cannula in or both, but the nurse totally botched it and blew up the vein in my hand and I got a great big pool of blood in my hand. Urrrgggh. A different nurse put a cannula in my elbow. They gave me antibiotics and fluids.
I was already regretting coming with two holes in me and all the SICK people around. Someone further down was coughing their lungs out. At least the guy in the bay next to me was in for a motorcycle accident and not an illness.
Then it was really just a whole heap of waiting around. Occasionally answering questions.
At 21:19 they decided they should do a CT scan of my belly. More radiation. Hurray. Not that they actually *did* the CT scan then, there was more waiting for that.
Stu gave up around 22:30 and went home.
At 23:15 I was still waiting and I was getting hungry. And needing to pee.
At 00:04 they gave me some panadol, and I also had some chocolate (emergency supplies of food were on my packing list for this very reason).
Shortly after and I went and had my CT scan, which was done by 00:25. They used contrast as well, maybe that'll kill my thyroid. Hurrah.
Then more waiting around (no rooms available yet to be admitted to).
They said I should try and sleep right there because they didn't know when a room would become available. But of course I had restless legs kick in at 01:51. I may have had a meltdown at this point. 38 is NOT a fever. I wasn't actually feeling unwell. There were sick people everywhere. They blew up a vein. They gave me a heap of extra radiation. And I was losing sleep. If anything coming to hospital would make everything WORSE.
Fortunately at 01:55 I was admitted and got moved to a room upstairs.
I was put in a room with some old guy (I didn't know coed was a thing in hospital wards!). I later found out he was Vince, 81, born in eastern Europe, migrated to Australia as a child after seeing his father shot in front of him, had lived a lot of his life in Japan, married a Japanese lady, had a few kids, but was now back in Australia after she died.
At 2:47 they gave me my nightly pills (only 5 hours late hurray). They didn't actually know about them, despite me telling them. That's the other thing about hospitals. You give them same information over and over again to each new person you see (you barely see the same person twice). While they take notes, noone seems to look at them, hence the need to tell them the same thing over and over again. It's ridiculous. Sigh.
I got maybe an hours' worth of sleep between 3 and 4.
Nurses came into see Vince at 4.
A doctor came in to see me at 5. They were like, why haven't you had to give a stool sample, why haven't they done an xray. But they noted it hasn't even been 7 days since chemo, so my immune system shouldn't be too bad at the moment. They also asked if I wanted to get moved to the private hospital (er no, I would rather go home).
At 5:25 they came to do obs. Super low blood pressure wheeee.
At 6:41 they came in to talk about breakfast and give me some antibiotics. They also asked for a poo sample. Yeah right, like I can just do it on command. With literally nothing to catch it in other than the little brown jar they gave me. Good luck with that.
At 7:40 I had some cheese and crackers because I was starving (see aforementioned note about emergency food supplies).
At 8:00 a nurse and the ward manager asked again if I still wanted to go to the private hospital and I'm like, no, I want to go home. Then they asked if I'd had blood taken this morning. No. In my head i'm like how do you not know this? Don't you have charts?? Don't you document this crap????
8:10 more obs. Blood pressure still a little low (113/76).
At 8:42 I finally got some breakfast.
At 9:10 they came to take more blood. The nurse took two goes to get a vein. Hole count: 4.
Meanwhile poor Vince was getting the run around. He had no idea what was actually happening. First they told him he was being taken to TCH at 10, then they told him he was getting an MRI here. He was getting frustrated at how badly the place was being run since being taken over by the ACT government. I don't really know what the place was like before (although I did have my appendix out here in 2019) but I was starting to agree with him with all the nonsense I was going through. In the end he got taken for a scan mid morning and I assume they lifted his nil by mouth because he had some morning tea later.
A pharmacist came by around 9:45 for a chat.
At 10:18 a lovely volunteer came by to ask if I needed anything.
At 10:35 a doctor (another one, up to three I think now) came by to discuss stuff. They brought up the results of my CT scan which was pretty cool (be nice if I could get access to that at some point). They did see evidence of imflammation in my gut, and confirmed diverticular disease, so at least that was useful. They were thinking I probably don't need to do a poo sample. And I could probably go home. But they wanted to talk to Dr LM first. They tried at 10:49 but he was busy for the next hour.
At 11:05 I was needing to poop. I asked if I need to collect any or not. She was like, um, yes I guess, and I was like, what do I catch it in? Crickets. So thought screw it and didn't do it. Why don't they stock those sheets you get when have to give samples for the bowel cancer screenings?? They make it much easier to get a stool sample.
At 13:03 I got some lunch.
13:42 was more antibiotics. A nurse was like "Not going home today?" and I'm like FFS can you just chase up Dr LM.
At 14:05 I went out to the nurses station outside my room. There were like twenty people all in pairs or groups talking to each other but literally noone there asked if I needed help. After a couple of minutes of literally noone paying any attention to me I went back to my room and pressed the buzzer. I said it's been over three hours since you last tried to talk to Dr LM can you PLEASE try again.
At 14:23 they were like, oh, it's hard to find doctors around here. Yeah cause it's a hospital, it must definitely be hard to find a doctor. FFS.
At 14:30 a registrar came by and said they'd talked to Dr LM and they said I could go home. Hurray! They'd give me some antibiotics but could come back if I got a fever.
At 15:05 they decided to discharge me. Got packed up and they wheeled me down and I waited in the exit room for the sweetie. At the car at 15:41 and then home.
That evening I took some antibiotics, and thought that any gut problems I have now could be from chemo, or antibiotics, or colitis, or diverticulitis. Hurray.
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What an utter debacle. I mean it was probably good that I got some antibiotics, as I probably had colitis, but I feel like if I'd just had some panadol last night this all would have passed. All the pain and troubles with my guts was on the Sunday night and it had settled by the Monday night. If I'd just relaxed, or rather just not taken my temperature, I wouldn't have even known about the fever. Given that I was exposed to sick people, got more radiation, and got no sleep, I think it was a negative net gain.
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