Annual Review

Yesterday was that day. Yes, that day we all hate - annual review day.

I left Arran on the 9.45am boat, sat about in Ardrossan for nearly an hour waiting for a train to Glasgow, then got another train out to the hospital and arrived at 12.50pm. My appointment wasn't until 1.30pm, so I just sat and tried to stay awake in the waiting room.

Clinic was late in starting, as usual, so at around 2 I was sent to X-ray, having only had a brief chat with 1 of the nurses, then told to go straight to physio then straight to lung function before heading back. Well, I sat in physio waiting room for half an hour and no sign of a physio! She eventually came but I only had 10 minutes of my appointment with her left so we did the 6 minute walk test then I left. I think I walked about the same distance as last year and my sats stayed mainly at 96 while walking and didn't drop below 95 which is an improvement on October. My lung function was up another 5% which was good news. All this walking and singing seem to be doing me good. Oh, and I only needed 3 vials of blood taken as I had full blood work done in February. Yay! We managed it in 1 go, which is a miracle considering the nurse just looked at my arm and my veins collapsed lol. It was VERY hot though so I think that helped.

My appointment with the Dr wasn't so great, if only because I don't feel I was listened to properly and didn't get the antibiotics I was hoping for to help my sinuses, just got told to eat ginger. Fine, I love ginger, and maybe they help a bit but my glands are all still swollen and the amount of horrible crap coming from them and the pain, I know I need an antibiotic! I'll give it a week. My chest was half sounded (didn't listen to the lower lobes and did a rush job) but apparently that was sounding ok.

I got a bit of a fright when I saw a letter written by a consultant to my GP about an x-ray taken in March, but having spoken to my GP today about it I feel much better. It said that the radiologist suggested I might have TB and that I should have a CT scan to investigate further, but I'm told apparently he/she didn't know I have CF and thought the CF changes were TB! Doh. Although, it does say as well that there has been deterioration since April 2012, particularly in the left base and upper right lobe. Bummer :/ I'm absolutely convinced that these are the areas I've been bleeding though, so totally not unexpected and having seen the x-ray when it was done in March I kinda knew it was coming, although I thought it might look better yesterday but it didn't.

Once that was all over I was ushered out mid-chat with the dietician because they were concerned I was going to miss my ferry lol, so I left the hospital at 4.45, got 2 trains back to Ardrossan then the 7.20pm boat and I was home at 8.30ish. Long bloody day.

But hey ho, at least that's it over for another year.

In real life, nothing much is happening. I'm practicing my piano a lot because I got some new pieces that I'm totally in love with. I'm still teaching, the invigilating for SQA exams finishes next week (thank god, never been so bored in my life!!) and in 5 weeks it's the summer holidays, wahoo!!