Recce by fire!

Woah… what a day.

Got quite excited about the MRI – finally, an end to the waiting, time to get things sorted out. Was picked up by an ambulance crew and wheeled out to my carriage (lights but no sirens again) and drove the 15-odd minutes to the University hospital. The best part of the day was the short period between the hospital and the ambulance when I was in the lovely sunshine, even though it was only for a few seconds it felt bloody marvelous!



I had been told the MRI would involve lying still with my body in a tube for about 45 minutes but it turned out to be double that time. Jenny was able to come with me and sat in the room with the doctor.(I have now seen far more of my husband than I ever thought possible – down to his spine, lungs, heart etc. Nor have I ever seen him so still… When we passed the hour mark I actually thought he would spontaneously combust! - Jenny)



Eventually it was all over and again we were back in the ambulance for the trip back to the Clinica Alemana. On the way, the doctor and ambulance crew gave us a bit of a city tour and, given my god awful hunger, by the time we got back we had the names of some good restaurants to try when I’m released. The lovely nursies plugged me into a liquid lunch drip which took the edge off my hunger but certainly didn't fill my belly.



I had only been back in my room about an hour when they took me away for an electrophysiological study. The idea was to try and provoke my heart to go wrong again so they could find what part was causing the arrhythmia. They succeeded.

Everything is pretty hazy from the procedure… they inserted the electrodes and played around with the rhythm of my heart for a while (I was awake, with a local anaesthetic), they manually made my heart speed up to around 150 odd bpm then dropped it back to 50.. All very surreal. Then they hit the jackpot, I knew they had it because I suddenly felt very strange and my heart rate roared up to 240 – basically what I had on Friday 6th. Things moved pretty quickly from this point, the nurse banged in a sedative sharpish and the next thing I knew, I was back in my room, trying to figure out what had happened.

All I can say is I’m glad I had had a few drinks when I had this before in KEMH because it was bloody scary when they did it this time with me sober!!

After a siesta, a doctor came in and explained that they had found what seems to have caused the problem…. Basically it looks like I have a piece of my heart that doesn’t work as it should; Jenny’s nagging about the amount of butter I eat has clearly been wasted as the doc says it’s something I was born with.

They are still examining the results of the MRI and the study from today but one option is to put a wire into my heart, connected to a battery which would shock my heart back into its proper rhythm, should the arrhythmia happen again. As the doc said, it would mean that if it went mad while we were out in the middle of nowhere, the electrical pulse would make it return to its proper beat.

It’s a relatively straightforward thing to do but the hospital here will have to contact our hospital and make sure they are happy for it to happen. …So that’s pretty much it for now.

A long day with no food but once again I hit the jackpot with two meals in quick succession so feel pretty human again now... BTW I learnt a new word... Ayuno means nil by mouth and once again I will be having that on my door again tomorrow.. :(