Time goes by so slowly...(Hepatitis C / Liver Transplant & Biopsy (Hep C) HCV Blog)

Well... It just aint been happening for me at the moment folks, which is damn frustrating!


If you haven't already picked it up via twitter or facebook, I didn't get to have my biopsy but just a rather expensive and annoyingly frustrating kind of a week.

As I said on my vid, I was due to go in on Tuesday - Fantastic. So I got up on Tuesday, pumped up and ready to go, dashed around a bit because on that morning I had an interview with a recruitment agency. That went well and as soon as I came out I thought, seeing as I was in town I would do a little retail therapy and hit the shops. I wanted to get myself a wireless internet 'dongle' so that I could keep in touch with the world whilst I was in hospital.

Many of you who have spent time in Hospital will know what I'm talking about when I say I feel so cut-off when I go in to these places, especially for something which you feel is routine or seemingly straight forward and then suddenly turns into a marathon 'staycation'.

If also like me, you use St Jimmy's specialist liver unit, you'll know there are no TV's on the wards. Now I know the phone signal is patchy inside the Hospital but, being a Vodafone customer, I have found that generally speaking I can get a signal. So I headed straight for the Vodafone store and re-emerged 20 minutes later with said item and £20 quid lighter, excellent. Now all I needed was to find was a 'vanilla slice', a cappuccino to go and my retail fix was done, cool!

Ok, once I got home I decided I would put an update on my blog. As my typing is still painfully slow even after all these years of using a keyboard, I decided the quickest way (and as Mandy and the kids were at work and school) was to use Mandy’s' laptop which has a webcam and post a video diary update. (http://youtu.be/vviKROJXEa8)

Ok, so after that I just had to load my 'dongle', pack and soon as we'd had tea and got the kids to bed at 7pm, I would get gone.

The reason for going in the evening before my biopsy was scheduled was to get me into a bed, get some blood taken out of me for tests, put a 'venflon' put in (see image) and then make sure I was 'nil by mouth' from midnight onwards.

Great, so I arrived and everything was going 'swimmingly' until a doctor came round and after 'blowing' a vein in the back of my left hand (not her fault, it's easily done!), we got onto the subject of medications and what drugs I was prescribed. As soon as I told her that I was on Warfarin for a clinical trial, we both realised that having a biopsy was not going to be an option! Goddamit!

I kick myself as I should've realised that taking a drug that thins your blood would probably help you bleed to death when they started trying to 'spike' you to take a peace of your liver away for examination - Warfarin stops your blood from 'clotting'! Ouch! Apparently I should’ve had a letter telling me to stop taking it five days prior to attending. I can only assume that as the study is being carried out by the Imperial College, London and not St James Hospital that it was an oversight and didn’t get sent. This was reaffirmed by the doctor who had no knowledge of my being on the study - bugger.

So after that I was told my bloods would be checked and then could go home in the morning once a new biopsy had been booked. Well, at least I got to check that my dongle worked OK! And I spent the next few hours chatting to guy in the next bed who had recently been 'transplanted' and consequently was still on high doses of meds - he babbled intensely and will probably have no recollection of ever meeting me but I hope I reassured him at the time that he was gonna be OK and was in safe hands. I know his situation only too well!

Next morning I was given a bowl of cornflakes and a cup of insipid tea and informed that my 'bloods' were fine and a date set for the following week to do it all over again! After hanging around to get my venflon taken out, I was released and went down to the main reception. As I'd driven myself in and parked my car in the hospitals' multi storey, I found the pay-parking machine and popped my car parking card in - £15.90!!! Yeas, I'll say that again, 15 bloody ponds, 90! To park overnight for something that didn't happen!!! Bloody Hell, I won't be doing that again.

So after running around the hospital to find a cash-point that worked before the price went up any further, I grabbed a Cappuccino to go to try and get rid of the very bitter taste in my mouth.

So that was last week in a nutshell. I was hoping to get the biopsy out of the way so I could try and make some decisions on moving forward. So many questions at the mo and I can feel the clock ticking away in the background all the while, bloody hell, it's like banging your head against a brick wall sometimes. This damn thing keeps stopping me every time I get started. Ho-Hum, we move on.

I did get some good news; both agencies I had signed on with came back to me with some possibilities of interviews. One fairly well paid but in London (which I'm not opposed to) and one not so but staying here (which is also good). Now I just need biopsy results so I can make a decision on what's best to do!!!

Watch this space, we'll try again this week - I go back in on Tuesday 2nd.

Take care everyone... Ian