What are you all up to

I have to be off out in an hour and am wondering if it's too early for OH's early morning cuppa. She's usually too sleepy to remonstrate with me.

The surgery pharmacists are offering a more in depth review on behalf of the GPs, going through blood test results, BP checks  etc However when it came to taking a BP reading  the pharmacist didn't follow the normal practice for taking further readings if the BP was up. It worries me slightly that procedures might not be adhered to. I could have asked her to do it but I decided not to. One interesting thing that came out from the review was cholesterol levels, I was under pressure to take statins not long ago but the overall results indicate that this shouldn't have happened (a technician and nurse were involved last time!) 

Since our busy local GPs have retired we have had no replacements and we're now down to one very hard pressed GP and a series of locums plus the new level of "assistants" like the pharmacist.

I quite agree you have to be clued up as much as possible about yourself as no one else will be!

We also have a nurse practitioner who I had an appointment to see.  Had a lump on the side of my head which he sort of dismissed even when I pointed out that it was very painful (unlike others) and it was growing in size.  After a week I demanded to see a doctor and next day I was with a consultant and within 2 weeks I had the first of two operations.  Now if they suggest the nurse practitioner I absolutely refuse.  

Totally agree you need to be clued up about your own medical conditions and ask questions! My mother is horrified when I do so on her behalf. But it has paid off for both of us. Being within tolerance is not where my body sits always. The GP I had who understood this retired, around Feb March i expect to have to defend my dosage.

The only person who knows your body and its reactions is you, so as Oneputt has pointed out stick with it. It can be done in a polite manner, but do resist the temptation of I told you so 😂.

Our wonderful pharmacist is semi retired now after 40 years of service, I'd trust what he had to say but that was mutually respected.

BRIGHT and breezy here this morning, feel so much more alive! Washing blowing nicely. Been very mundane here but I like it that way at times.

KjNelln you'll be more than ready for a rest. As my mum says wear the old uns out first!

Tricky good to hear from you hope you can sort out Concorde for your Christmas trip. Today's breeze should help with drying 😉.

Enjoy your day folks however you spend it.

Of course everyone should be aware of the medication they are taking and understand the reasons why. I book six monthly appointments with my doctor for a regular check up. Both of us take statins, Margaret because of her diabetes and heart operation and me because at a certain age they change the criterion as to what level of cholesterol where it is recommended that a person should start taking them. So before a certain age they will be quite happy with a persons level of cholesterol but after that age the level they are happy with drops almost by half! I often think of my parents generation who grew up pre National Health Service. Hopefully all this precautionary medication we now take is doing some good!!!

As an aside our surgery has employed a couple of Paramedics. The idea being to take pressure off the current doctors. They are a half way house between the nursing staff and the doctors but they can deal with a lot of common less serious problems and of course also the more serious issues they came across in their day to day lives on the road. 

David

In some ways we are seasoned travellers through the NHS but for others I'm wondering if they'll get the best attention when needed.

Have been out in the garden but the wind is picking up so have got some of the jobs done and spotted others that need doing. I have been kidding myself that's it's nearly bedded down for the winter but on closer inspection it isn't! 

YMuch cooler today and quite breezy decided on spur of moment to have a night at Commons Wood before heading off to FM,so we can load van and get it warmer,and as a bonus when getting it out of storage the pitch five up from us was going and said he was giving up with c/van and getting a static(has been in the storage for as long as us 1985), his pitch has far easier access so have now swopped (with wardens consent)  so less use of MM  now as it is a straight back in and pull out

Two years ago when OH was taken ill while in Spain (kidney stone) he was put on anti inflammatory tablets. Long story short he got worse and worse so we flew home. He was in hospital for a week getting worse, the pain was so bad they had him morphine.

All possible scans were done and no stone was seen, (obviously passed) they couldn't find anything else wrong with him,  other than the pain he was in.

The hospital pharmacist came to see him and observed that he was on anti inflammatory tablets, the question she asked was why if he had no sign of inflammation.

The result was he was taken off them and within 24 hours he was feeling a bit better, within another 24 hrs they could reduce the pain relief to just codeine and paracetamol. Turns out that in rare cases anti inflammatories  can 'upset' the kidneys. 

The village chemist works very closely with our surgery, they are very good at changing your prescription to the Generic (cheaper) version. I've have asked on 2 occasions for them not to do that, as they were less effective.  

We are very lucky in our village as we have 2 full time Dr's and 1 part time, they are busy but if and emergency they will usually fit you in. Nurses do lots of the clinics, which does take a lot of the mundane stuff of the Dr's.

Sunny and bright this morning, getting dark and dull now.

I hope you’ve got your speakers set up now. I did one at a time, starting with the one nearest the router. 

Two worked fine (after I used the right passwords), but we had to buy a Wi-fi extender for the other two. 

All our music is loaded onto I-tunes on the Desktop PC, and it’s brilliant to select any artist or album from almost anywhere in the house. There’s stil a part of the house that’s out of reach of the signal, but it’s only really used when we have a house full, so we’ve not bothered with installing speakers.

We are not all hi tech though - we have a lot of vinyl records that we play on an old but decent hifi .