The History of our Lives for the Past Few Weeks: No. 2: The Clinic
The Breast Clinic at the Women's is rather like a conveyor belt: Turn up, wait, move to another waiting area, wait, test, wait, another waiting area, test, wait, move.... Plus spending half an afternoon dressed in a fashionable hospital shift ('you can wear it either way round' : however I'd rather accidently show my back than my front, thank you.)
The mammogram wasn't too bad. The literature said it can be uncomfortable and occasionally painful, but I didn't find it too much of a problem. The difficulty I had was all the contortionism that was needed: move your feet to the left a bit, your bottom to the right, stick your bottom out, put your hand on your head, chin up.... I found in the end that it was my ankle that hurt, due to the position I was in. I can't say it was a pleasant sensation being squashed, but better in some ways than the dentist's!
Then it was more waiting, an ultrasound, yet more waiting then meeting the consultant and having fine needle aspiration and a biopsy. The aspiration they describe as having an injection in reverse, the biopsy (under local anaesthetic) the literature they give you describes as sounding like a gun going off. Not the most encouraging of analogies, however I only read that post procedure. It sounds more like a staple gun.
This part of the procedure was observed by a medic from Akrotiri, the British base in Cyprus. He was visiting Birmingham which is a centre for defense medicine, to brush up on his clinical skills. He was a Wing Commander, and we had a rather surreal conversation about how nice Cyprus was at this time of year, while all the above was being sorted. Very polite chap with a very plummy accent.
We then had about an hour's wait, while the results from the aspiration came through: the biopsy will take a few days.
When we came back (after the standard shunt between waiting areas), we were told that the lump was cancer. Basically, they can take it out along with some of the surrounding healthy tissue (a wide local excision) along with some of the lymph nodes under the arm. I'm booked in for this on 3rd Jan (going in on the 2nd) and should be in for a couple of days. At the moment I'm not too worried about this: yet another operation, different hospital this time; it's at the QE, which is just opposite the women's. At least the scar will be in a different place.
After the op, I'll be having radiotherapy and, because I'm so young, (!) chemotherapy. Quite how this will affect me remains to be seen, and I've no idea how well or ill I'll be during the process.
The mammogram wasn't too bad. The literature said it can be uncomfortable and occasionally painful, but I didn't find it too much of a problem. The difficulty I had was all the contortionism that was needed: move your feet to the left a bit, your bottom to the right, stick your bottom out, put your hand on your head, chin up.... I found in the end that it was my ankle that hurt, due to the position I was in. I can't say it was a pleasant sensation being squashed, but better in some ways than the dentist's!
Then it was more waiting, an ultrasound, yet more waiting then meeting the consultant and having fine needle aspiration and a biopsy. The aspiration they describe as having an injection in reverse, the biopsy (under local anaesthetic) the literature they give you describes as sounding like a gun going off. Not the most encouraging of analogies, however I only read that post procedure. It sounds more like a staple gun.
This part of the procedure was observed by a medic from Akrotiri, the British base in Cyprus. He was visiting Birmingham which is a centre for defense medicine, to brush up on his clinical skills. He was a Wing Commander, and we had a rather surreal conversation about how nice Cyprus was at this time of year, while all the above was being sorted. Very polite chap with a very plummy accent.
We then had about an hour's wait, while the results from the aspiration came through: the biopsy will take a few days.
When we came back (after the standard shunt between waiting areas), we were told that the lump was cancer. Basically, they can take it out along with some of the surrounding healthy tissue (a wide local excision) along with some of the lymph nodes under the arm. I'm booked in for this on 3rd Jan (going in on the 2nd) and should be in for a couple of days. At the moment I'm not too worried about this: yet another operation, different hospital this time; it's at the QE, which is just opposite the women's. At least the scar will be in a different place.
After the op, I'll be having radiotherapy and, because I'm so young, (!) chemotherapy. Quite how this will affect me remains to be seen, and I've no idea how well or ill I'll be during the process.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home