The Befouled Weakly News
2 August 2009 Good morning to you all and although it is a pleasure to be able to infest your inbox with another dose of drivel, I have to confess to being somewhat disappointed that my surgery was muddled once again – now the plan is to do it on Tuesday morning, barring any further mishaps. You will recollect, I am sure, that this appointment started in a somewhat less than satisfactory manner – the hospital telephoned me two weeks ago on a Sunday evening at about 7.00 pm asking where I was; they were expecting me at the hospital to perform my neck surgery on the following Monday. As I wrote last time, the letter informing me of these arrangements clearly never arrived here but one has to give the hospital the benefit of the doubt, I suppose, and assume that it was actually sent. (Perhaps it will turn up in fifty years time and become one of those amusing little anecdotes about letters having gone astray and turning up decades later). The discussion we had with the person on the phone was that she would telephone me the following day with a decision about when, subsequently, to schedule the surgery. She did indeed ring me back and surgery was arranged for Friday morning, as you know. So, on Thursday afternoon we drive down to Oxford and present ourselves at reception for the ward. Good news – they are expecting me and even better news, they have a bed for me. In a matter of moments I am settled in, say “hello” to the roommates and generally make myself as comfortable as possible in a hospital ward. Ms Penelope stayed for a time to keep me company and eventually she set off for home. I watched a few DVDs on my laptop and eventually, sometime around midnight, attempted to get some sleep, not an easy task, I am afraid. Morning arrived, as it does, with the usual explosion of noise and activity common of a hospital ward, but of course no morning tea or corn flakes for me. Everything, so far, was fine. The nurse had checked me regularly, had taken my blood pressure and all the other things which need doing. The pharmacist visited and discussed the medication I am currently taking and I was told that the anaesthetist and the surgeon would be visiting shortly. So, I waited. And waited. And waited some more. Eventually, one of the nurses approached and, with some trepidation I think, told me that there seemed to be a slight problem – my name did not appear to be on any of the surgical lists. I was a bit confused so I explained the previous miscommunication (the case of the missing letter) and explained that I had been told to arrive on Thursday for surgery on Friday morning. I was also confused because they certainly knew that I was due when I presented myself at reception and that there was a bed ready for me, evidenced by the fact that I was in it! The nurse went off to investigate. It’s now lunchtime and I am starving of course; periodically the nurse reappears to assure me that she is trying to get to bottom of the situation and that she is waiting to speak with the surgeon who is in a meeting. Finally, the nurse reappears once again to tell me that she has interrupted the meeting and that the surgeon will be with me as soon as she is able. When the surgeon finally arrives, she too is confused. It seems that my name is not on any of the surgical lists and, more pertinently, it never could have been on the Friday list as Fridays are reserved for emergencies only; my surgery is certainly not an emergency. She went off to investigate some more and then came back to discuss a range of options. How would surgery in a couple of weeks do? Unfortunately, we have a wedding to attend, I explained. How about after the wedding? Well, we have some plans to hopefully make a trip to the States in September. So, eventually, she agreed to do the surgery on Tuesday morning (allegedly, I will be first on her list which would be nice). In short, a miscommunication of considerable proportions – something one reads about and hears on the news but not something that you expect to affect you (and somewhat annoying when it does). As near as we can work out, the person with whom I spoke on the telephone who “confirmed” that I should come for surgery on Friday, seems to have secured the bed for me but neglected to put my name on any of the surgical lists. Once my name failed to appear on a list it was impossible to squeeze me in – no anaesthetist available even if the surgeon had been prepared to try and do two operations in the same theatre at the same time. So, there you have it. (And this is not to mention the numerous journeys up and down the motorway Ms Playchute made whilst everyone was trying to work out what had gone wrong). I’m in again on Monday afternoon for surgery on Tuesday morning; assuming all goes well I will recount the adventure next week. On another issue completely, some of you will remember, back in May, we carried a reference to the Met Office’s prediction that we would enjoy a fantastic summer this year, a BBQ summer they dubbed it. The headline at the time, 30 April, was for a “Hot and Dry UK Summer” and the opening paragraph read, “The UK is ‘odds on for a barbecue summer’, with no repeat of the washouts of the last two years.” Remembering our previous comments on the accuracy of some previous particularly apocalyptic weather predictions, you will perhaps find it as amusing as we did to read the headline on the BBC web site this week: “Met office cools summer forecast” which, considering the weather we’ve had currently and through most of July, is something of a belated admission that they got it wrong. To be fair, the latter part of June was very pleasant but since then it’s been pretty miserable. Still, today looks like it could be one of those gloriously lovely days which will be a splendid change. You can read the latest forecast/fairy tale here. And finally, another story with which it’s hard to disagree – Guinness is good for you! Love to you all, Greg In sympathy with the main theme of today’s edition, Allegedly Actual Entries on Hospital Charts
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