Category Archives: hospitals

well that was an effing waste of time

25 Wednesday Feb 2026

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I’m now extra glad I hadn’t unwittingly headed off to my cardiology revision two weeks ago because wasting time and money getting to the hospital and back yesterday without getting caught up in the tractor strike was bad enough. I had guessed that this revision was going to be the usual EKG and asking about the tachycardia. Which they did. But the doctor (another new one, I never see the same specialist twice) didn’t listen at all. He spent the entire visit typing out the report, even when I told him that that very morning I’d had a very unusual tachycardia episode that lasted about three hours. I explained that it was a condition I’ve had since my mid-twenties (he’s nodding and typing) and nobody has ever been able to tell me why it’s happening, that I’ve wondered if it is POTS but it has never been diagnosed as such. I stressed that it is very rare when it doesn’t stop within a few minutes and said that since it happened I was feeling some pain just above my left breast.

“Oh, that’s nothing, nothing to do with the arrhythmia”. His advice was that the next time I should go and get an EKG done while the tachycardia is happening so they can better judge was is causing it. WTAF? I asked him where I was supposed to get an instant EKG and he said to go to my health centre or to a private clinic. Again… wtf? I explained (again) that the episodes don’t usually last that long, and the times they have, and I was worried enough to go to emergency, they always stopped before I got in to see a doctor. So he said I could get a mobile “Kardia” heart monitor, wrote the name down for me, and said that was all he could do. He then gave me a perfunctory once over with the stethoscope and pronounced me “just fine”, printed out his report and said “see you in a year”. Except of course I doubt I will ever see this guy again.

So I dunno. Reckon this Kardia thing is worth it? It seems most home monitoring gadgets are far from reliable. Maybe I should splash out on an Apple watch instead?

suprise shoulder ultrasound

12 Thursday Feb 2026

Posted by in sevilla, hospitals, health, knees, knee saga

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Well okay, it wasn’t a surprise that I was getting one but every since I bailed on my shoulder MRI last April (lasted approx 7 seconds in the COFFIN DEATH MACHINE) and got to see another traumatologist in June I’ve been waiting for this appointment. Which also wasn’t a surprise because it seems like all I do these days is wait for appointments. But after having to cancel my cardiology revision on Tuesday DUE TO TRACTORS I was actually expecting yesterday’s way too early phone call to be from them… instead it was from the Hospital Virgen del Rocío saying I had an ultrasound appointment the following morning at 10.00 am. So… surprise!

In the grand scheme of things the chronic shoulder pain I’ve had for… seemingly ever?… doesn’t begin to compete with the FUCKING KNEE PAIN which now seems to be extending to my left knee, possibly due to original fucking knee pain putting lower back out (hello sciatica, my old nemesis) so all movement now is fraught with potentially fucking up… basically everything else? I don’t know. All I know is that everything hurts all the time these days.

Anyhow, back to today’s hospital visit. It actually went very smoothly. Easily found taxis to get me there and back again (not always the case). And since I pretty much know Virgen del Rocío inside out by now I got to my ecografía waiting area just on time (seriously, you try it, they don’t make it easy) and was called in almost immediately. And the doctors were great. I almost felt like I was in a THE PITT episode when a young man came over and introduced himself, telling me his name and saying he was a resident intern (hey we all gotta learn sometime). Happily he was soon accompanied by the actual doctor in charge but she let him search away on my shoulder with the magic wand and there was plenty of back and forthing between them about what they were actually seeing on the screen.

Then the head doc took over and first thing she said was… how do you pronounce your name? I told her and after that she used it every time she had something to tell me. I thought that was a nice touch. Anyhoodle… apparently my shoulder is fucked, as if I didn’t know. It wasn’t possible to see whether the tendon is torn or just (just!) damaged and inflamed. But head doc told me that either outcome wouldn’t change the treatment or the pain involved. When I told her about the MRI debacle she said that for this particular issue an ultrasound is more useful than an MRI. Okey dokey.

So on to treatment. And the here we go again cycle… she said aside from anti-inflammatories and painkillers there might be some physiotherapy that could help but I needed to see the traumatologist again. And so now I wait. Again.

 

 

 

tractors galore

10 Tuesday Feb 2026

Posted by in health, hospitals, sevilla

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Today I had the cardiology revision appointment made last July after cutting Flecainide from my prescription (which immediately made me feel better). I wasn’t sure what they were actually going to do today other than the usual ECG and ask about the tachycardia. Then it turned out they didn’t do anything because I WAS WAYLAID BY HUNDREDS OF TRACTORS and couldn’t go. Well fuck.

Don’t get me wrong, I fully support the demonstration by the thousands of farmers and their hundreds of tractors that brought Sevilla to a standstill today. I just didn’t know it was happening. So if I hadn’t checked the Number 3 bus route for times I wouldn’t have seen the alert (the main tractor route is also my route to the hospital) I would have been so fucked. Now I’m just both relieved and disappointed.

I was able to put in an online request to change today’s appointment so, you know, whatever. It was a revision, hopefully nothing urgent, and now I am waiting to hear about about the new date. But I’d been kind of dreading today, and in a way am a bit annoyed now I couldn’t just get it over with (esp after all the build up over the past few days). But I have a warm purring Morcilla cuddled up on my shoulder as I type (she’s happy I stayed home!) and sossiges & spinach mash coming up for lunch. How was your Tuesday?

churros therapy…

17 Monday Nov 2025

Posted by in health, hospitals, knee saga, knees, sevilla, spain

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Nope, I’m not in Jerez. This is that other only time I eat churros – after an early-morning doctor’s appointment. Remember back when I showed you this video and was concerned because it said that to evaluate the progression of knee arthrosis the surgeon needs to see a weight-bearing x-ray, and for the ones taken in August I was lying on a metal table-bed thing.

So I got in touch with my GP (phone appt) and asked if she could request a weight-bearing knee x-ray for me before my next (ha!) surgeon’s appointment. She had a look at the x-rays on her computer and said that the report said they were weight-bearing (con carga), but I told her I distinctly remembered lying down because when they turned my legs to the side it hurt. She said that was for the lateral ones, the front ones were done standing up according to the chart. Which I don’t remember at all. These were done in a mobile unit x-ray station outside the hospital and I was sure I got up on the table and they did both x-rays that way. Or was I? Fuck. Thinking back, there didn’t even seem to be enough room in there to do a standing up x-ray. Anyhow, I convinced her to make another x-ray appointment for me which was today. At 9.00 in the morning at a health centre way the fuck far away.

Last week I tried to change the appointment to a later time (sometimes you can do this online) but couldn’t find a way, nor could I find a number to call. So whatever. It would have to be today at 9.00. I already knew I would spend a mostly sleepless night (and I was right!) but the other thing was that Storm Claudia still wasn’t done with us, though according to the weather office she’d be clearing out by noon today. Damn. Well, maybe I’d have some luck? Spoiler alert – nope.

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emt time

03 Friday Oct 2025

Posted by in health, hospitals, sevilla

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UPDATE (Monday Oct 6th): turned out it was Flu A (not Covid – phew!) and after that first scare on Friday his temp went down to normal. Today he still tested positive for flu but with a very faint line showing, so hopefully he’ll be all better soon.

Well, not your usual Friday evening at Casa Azahar. Last night I woke up a few times to hear Peter coughing away in his room. He’d been out on a tapas tour and got home after I’d gone to bed. But he hadn’t been coughing before he left. Anyhow, I had a sherry tasting today and when I headed out around noon, Peter was still asleep so I didn’t disturb him. But when I got home late afternoon he was still in bed. So I made him some noodles in chicken broth and put it on his bedside table with a glass of lemonade. A few minutes later I heard a THUD… he’d fallen out of bed trying to sit up, and couldn’t get up off the floor.

In moments of pure panic like this I go stone cold, stop feeling. I tried several times to help lift him up but there was no strength there at all. I’m thinking STROKE and trying not to go there, trying to keep Peter calm (he was so scared) and trying to think of what to do next. And so I called the emergency 112 number on my fridge door, talked to a woman who asked me all kinds of questions, so many I said “aren’t we wasting time here??” and she said “no, the team is already on its way, I’m just getting extra information”. Phew.

The EMT team got here in about 10 minutes, three of them came crowding into Peter’s room with all their equipment, managed to lift him up into his chair and then started in on all the various tests. First of all they wanted to rule out a stroke, he had a portable ekg done, he was given IV paracetamol… I’d say they were here for about 30-40 minutes (though by then I was really losing track of time) doing this and that test. Turned out he had a fever of 38ºC. I think just having the team there helped Peter feel better, less afraid. Honestly they were so good, even having fun with trying to speak English to him and making him laugh. So he relaxed.

They gave Peter the option of going to the hospital with them for observation or staying at home, and he wanted to stay home. So now I’ve got to monitor his temperature and, if it doesn’t improve or gets worse, I was told to call the other emergency number 061 and they’d be back. And that’s where we are.