HOME AGAIN

Yesterday morning the neurologist bought some students to see OG and during the session he blurted out "now that the drip has finished you can go home". It was like a bolt out of the blue and my emotions ranged from "thank goodness for that" to "help! now we will be on our own again." It's quite a scary prospect really because he is still so ill and helpless.

But, stiff British upper lip and all that, we prepared ourselves to leave, not quite believing what he had said. Luckilly our daughter was on her way to visit and happened to still have his "home" clothes in her car.

Early in the afternoon the neurologist popped up again to say "before you go today you will need to see the Liver Consultant because we have to get a liver biopsy date confirmed", Ah! knew there was a catch. I don't actually think that this elusive breed of individual really exists although OG did say that he had spoken to one last week. Mind you, OG was high on morphine at the time and I'm quite doubtful that this conversation really did happen.

So we sat around all afternoon, occasionally randomly accosting the odd doctor or two to check out the facts. Yes, we did have to wait for the Liver Consultant, and no we couldn't go until he had been. When he still hadn't arrived at 1830 I said to the nurse "There is no way that a Consultant is still in this hospital at this time of night unless he is here to see a private patient". She said, "Ah, you know them so well". We left.

So, now we are out in the community again at the mercy of our elusive GP and the District Nurse. I have arranged a "review meeting" with the GP next Monday, his earliest appointment, called the District Nurse and spoke to her voice mail and made an appointment with the oncologist on Friday week. Fingers crossed that everything goes OK.

On the bright side OG had a great night last night and has slept all morning. He is so much better here at home and I am more at ease with my basic nursing skills than most of the highly paid "professionals".