Tip of the day

Yesterday and today were a bit weird, as Ros went into Derriford yesterday morning for a blood test and I went in after lunch to get formally put on their books.

As you might expect I took all my blood and bone marrow test results in to help speed them up. They decided to give me a venesection - blood letting again, which did not happen for 4 1/2 hours - at which time the male nurse, who was getting tired as they were short staffed, failed to get any blood out twice - which is very painful.
Today I had to come back in before lunch and try again - a female nurse, as it happened, had a go at the venesection which worked first time. The male nurse was stood next to us. We figured out what the problem was - during the whole 4 1/2 hours I was in yesterday, I had not had a drink, my veins would contract, they would be hard to find, no blood, …
So the tip from the lady nurse was:
 

• 'If you are having blood taken for any reason, have a lot to drink during the couple of hours before. Say a big bottle of squash or something
• That way your veins pop up and it’s much easy, and less painful.

Then Ros was in during the afternoon to see the consultant - her haemoglobin is down, and she is on the border line of being neutropenic so may need a blood transfusion next week. The trouble is, if you give too much blood, the bone marrow gets lazy and does not do its job. She was able to reduce one of the nastier tablets again today - so that will help.

Ros's son is worried that he might have something wrong with him - so a strategy was devised where the GP can put his mind at rest, or even take a blood test to show him that he is OK. He is a smart lad and heard about hereditary problems and put 2 and 2 together.

We are both feeling fine, other than the tiredness you get with these issues, and after all that we did not even meet up for a coffee.