Room 101

For any non-regular readers, there are two important things that you need to know in order to appreciate this post. The first, is that about three weeks ago I had a minor heart attack and spent a week in hospital (see The English Patient (1) and The English Patient (2)). The other, and in some ways more important and relevant background information is that I have a truly dreadful, enormous, terribly gripping phobia about needles and medical procedures (see The Blood Donor for a fuller explanation).

So you can imagine my joy on discovering that I had to go to Papworth hospital for a 20 minute procedure called an angiogram. The procedure itself is normally quite routine and done under a local anaesthetic (joy, oh joy!) In order to find out about the state of your arteries, they find the femoral artery in your groin, stick a catheter up it, pump dye into it, they take photos of the resultant blood movement round your system. And of course, because you are conscious, you can see the lovely pictures and hear the conversation!

I can logically accept that it was necessary and good and that it would help diagnose my problem. After all, I had had the heart attack, but nobody knew why.

On learning that this procedure was awaiting me, and on suspecting that they would want to take yet another blood test, I went into serious panic mode in the days leading up to the hospital visit. We telephoned and wrote to Papworth to inform them of the extra difficulty that I had. I followed the advice of my doctor and friends and went to see a qualified clinical hypnotherapist for four sessions. Despite the loss of a considerable amount of money, and despite being assured that I was a good hypnotherapy subject (I entered the ‘zone’ quite easily), the hypnotherapy did not work at all for me. After four sessions about my phobia, I was so wound up I was unable to listen to the tape that the hynotherapist had given me to listen to on the day prior to entering the hospital. Even mentioning the word ‘needle’ freaked me out at that time.

Yesterday was the day. On Monday some friends came round to cheer me up and took me out to lunch. In my over melodramatic way I felt like a criminal having a final meal before awaiting some horrendous torture in the Tower. GET A GRIP I told myself, though I slept little, and slouched into the car the following morning with a dreadful sense of inevitablity happening and me being powerless to stop it.

Papworth. Papworth. Papworth!!! The nurses were very nice, especially the one who tried to disentangle me from the x-ray machine and hold my head firmly in an attempt to keep me on the table after I had tried to remove myself. They have a very smooth and professional and caring routine there.

We arrived at 9:30 as requested and were told to come back at 11.00. The waiting, the waiting! At 11:00 I was admitted, bedded, shaved (never had my groin shaved by a woman in uniform before!), and told I would be ‘going down’ at 15:00. Only four more hours of waiting and watching what they were doing to everyone else and hearing even when the curtains were drawn round.

Of course, the vampires immediately wanted blood. We pointed out the phonecalls and letters we had sent about my phobia and had a measure of success. They agreed not only to not bother trying with my arm, but also to get some blood from the artery itself at 15:00 as part of the procedure, so at least I didn’t have to sit on my hands (the alternate site to the arms) for four hours. We had requested sedatives, and after chasing I eventually got one. It had no discernible effect. As my wife later pointed out, one tablet might have knocked out a budgie but it was never going to have any effect on an old white rhino!

I was taken down an hour early at 14:00 for the routine 20 minute procedure and came out 45 minutes later! When the nurse on the ward saw the wound she said: “Blimey, they obviously had fun with you then!”

Stage 1. The first lie. “The worst bit will be the injection for the local anaesthetic. …. That’s all over now …. The worst is over. You won’t feel a thing from now on.”
Stage 2 The second lie. “Inserting it now … You won’t feel a thing.”
Stage 3 Knowing I have been conned. Me screaming. Raising head and wrapping myself round x-ray machine above me and nearly kicking doctor in groin. “Ok,ok, ok. We obviously need to give you some more local anaesthetic.” (I’m an old, white rhino for goodness sake, not a budgie!)
Stage 4 Nice nurse firmly holds my head while I desperately try to regain composure and not look at the pictures on the screen or listen to the conversation.
Stage 5 “Injecting dye now …. oh we have a problem here. Are you going to clean the mess on the floor now nurse. I will need to get some new shoes after this. …. We have a slight problem … There appears to be a kink in the tube. We are going to have to take it out and put another one in!”
Stage 6 Taking first one out and putting second one in.
Stage 7 Trying hard not to listen to converstation.
Stage 8 “All over now. You were really brave etc etc!”
Stage 9 Worried wife. “Why did they keep you so long?”
Stage 10 I was clamped to stop bleeding etc.
I was let out at around 18:30.

The good news is that at least they now know what caused my heart attack. Two of my major arteries are fairly restricted. The bad news. “You will have to come back here again and we will do an angioplasty - stick a balloon thingey on the end of the catheter. This opens the arteries up and then we insert shunts to keep them open.” Yippee! “Yes, it is done under local anaesthetic. Like today only longer.”

I look forward to that like I would look forward to sticking needles in my eyes!!! Logically I know it will keep me alive and get me back to normal fitness. Psychologically, I know that it is my worst nightmare to be repeated. Room 101 here I come. Again!