Finally, my Retuximab infusion has started (at about 6.00pm)... We arrived at the hospital, as directed, at about 9.45am!! Regrettably, there is a lot of inefficiency around this procedure. It depends on a long 'chain of command' to get an appropriate 'sign off'.
The infusion, even if it can be accelerated periodically, will last several hours. I'm hoping to be out by around 9.00pm.... A twelve-hour stint!!
Should we complain? No, not a bit... We need to start a new trend called 'gratefulness'... Without the NHS 'free at the point of use' we would be bankrupt, for sure!! I also get fed-up of hearing people complain around me. They complain from morning to night, anything from room temperature to the texture of the custard on their chocolate sponge pudding!!!
The thing is, individual staff are superb; they are tenacious and caring. It's the bureaucratic system that's at fault.... And what created that? In my view, complaining and 'claim conscience' patients!! The NHS therefore has to invent ways of mitigating risk of being sued!! We all need to get off this silly 'roundabout' - and simply accept that some things, medically, go wrong!! One day perhaps!
Well, this should be my last infusion of this (ultra expensive) drug, so that, at long last, my immune system will be stable. No-one knows what caused it to flair up in the first place... Even though there was a 'hunt' for the 'smoking gun'... It just shows how intricate and precisely 'tuned' our immune systems are made.... As the Psalmist said - and quoted on my front page - we are fearfully and wonderfully made.... It has only gone wrong since the 'Fall'.
Christians are simply not 'immune' (an apt word) from the 'hard knocks of life'.... As Jesus commentated on a tragedy, when a tower collapsed, killing 18 people, he said, "do you think these people were any more guilty than the rest of the people living in Jerusalem?, I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you too will all perish."
This is a sobering and insightful comment! It also leads me towards a 'gratitude-centred' life!
Of course, I might be wrong.... But, I would rather go down, without a 'bitter and twisted' mentality toward life - and the people around me who have been nothing short of amazing!!
Just updating this Blog, to say that we finally got home at just before midnight! Kim was far more 'put out' than me, quite understandably because she was facing a long day of work today! she coped really well.