On Monday afternoon I had a routine blood test, to check that my toe was all healing nicely. It seems it is.

Later that evening I get a call from the blood people, asking why I had the test (told them) they asked if I was feeling ok (I was) as there was an elevated liver function. They said they’d pass the details to the consultant that requested and my GP.
Thursday I get a letter from the consultant saying the same an that I should stop drinking alcohol ( no issue, I’ve had 1 glass of very nice whisky since the end of October…) and go for some more bloods within a week. No problem.

Friday morning I get a call from my GP (not met him yet) saying I need to go see him, like, now. Luckily was WFH due to train strikes. GP sends me to surgical assessment in hospital. They prod and poke me, ask if I feel ok (still do) and take some blood. They then send me for an ultrasound. This comes back normal. They then tell me they are admitting me overnight to keep an eye on me.

Roll on this morning and I see the doc, he tells me everything is normal, save for a very elevated ALT test (1400, ideal levels are sub 40). He is happy for me to go home if bloods that have just been taken show that it’s stable/dropped. He says I should chase it up if I haven’t heard by 1 o’clock. Well it’s just after 5pm now and despite chasing hourly, the bloods still aren’t available, but they will let me know as soon as they are.

I suspect now I won’t be getting out until Monday, but no one will give a definite answer, so I can’t make arrangements with work/family etc

All this means I think there is something they are not telling me (the on call doc said ‘oh, 10 years ago we’d keep you in for weeks with something like this). If there is shit news, so be it, tell me what it is and I can deal with it

What’s also irritating is I suspect the GP has got over excited as he has seen this result in isolation, not knowing my medical history (he asked if I’d had any problems with my feet recently at all…) when actually the (diabetic and endocrine) consultant was happy enough to keep an eye from a distance (I see her/her team weekly)

Further to my irritation, I’ve been given no treatment. Either treat me or let me go home?!?!

In more positive news, this ward is newer than the one in York, and the food so far has been marginally better…

Sorry for the vent, part of me need to type it all out, part of me needed something to do…

Sounds like you’ve received excellent service to me in the current climate of so many cancellations and lack of beds. Your GP would have read your notes so would know about your toe. Bloods can sometimes take an age to come back.

Still waiting is a real pain.

That’s the thing that baffles as well drac, I’m 100% sure there is someone much more in need of this bed, and given I live 10 mins from the hospital, seems like an awful waste

Good you think like that but they will soon boot you out if the need to.

I think you’re a victim of a stretched service, but they don’t want to let you go as they’re being cautious.

I can sympathise with your annoyance, hope it all turns out well!

We can play STW eyespy if that’ll help. You go first.

I had an adverse reaction to some antibiotics some years back, i went slightly yellow and they kept an eye on me for a bit but no lasting impact.

Fingers crossed for a similar result

Which hospital are you sampling the menu from?

St James’ in Leeds

Looks like drac has put a good word in for me, not wanting to jinx anything, but apparently the doc is on his way up to discharge me…

ALT is an enzyme that is found inside healthy liver cells; lots of it in healthy livers and not so much in long-term unhealthy livers. The cells always leak a bit and so a detectable level exists in the blood (and a normal range can therefore be defined)

acutely damaged liver cells (for any reason – and remeber “acute” means over a short period, not severe) leak more of this stuff and so blood levels go up. Your level is pretty sporting but that doesn’t tell them hardly anything about why it happened (sometimes the results of other enzymes & processes help) but possibly implies that your long-term liver health has been OK and that it’s just angry “now” for some reason.

They can’t really treat what they can’t identify so waiting for a repeat test is fair enough – obvz they can’t let you out before that in case it had gone up.

IANAD, and regardless you need the doc who’s read all your notes to give proper clarity

On the bright side.If you were a septic and did’nt have health insurance you’d owe the hospital about 20k by now.

Aand I’ve escaped! Bloods showed no change but are stable, follow up tests on Monday.

Had the tests mentioned above yesterday (in Harrogate, not Leeds)
Doc in Leeds surgical assessment unit rings me this morning, around 11…

‘Why didn’t you have your bloods done’
‘I did, in Harrogate’
‘We asked you to get them done here’
‘The nurse said it would be ok to get them done in Harrogate’
‘Why did you go to Harrogate? Do you live in Harrogate?’
No, I live in Leeds, I work in Harrogate, see Harrogate for all my various ailments, and it was them that first discovered the issue’
‘I can’t see the results’
‘Oh’
‘Was it Dr ******’
‘Yes’
‘And you had XYZ tests?’
‘Yes’
‘Hang on, I need to look at these….OK, there’s been no change, you still need to come to Leeds ASAP for those tests’
‘OK, I’m in Harrogate now, can’t get there till 630/7 really’
‘You need to get here ASAP, I’ll be here till 8’

So I leave work early, but due to trains/traffic, it’s 6 before I arrive and check in at the surgical assessment unit

It’s 8 O’clock now, seen no one, at all, for these urgent blood tests. That have to be performed by a doctor. In Leeds, only.

I know they are working very hard, in my best interests, and I owe my life to the NHS, so it’s tough to kick off, but AAARRRRGGGGHHHHHH

Thats just rubbish

computer systems that don’t talk to each other. In Scotand the GPs have a very good system that will allow any GP to see tests and the like and so do hospitals – but a GP can’t see hospital stuff and vice versa. the hospital has to send a posted letter with the results to the GP!

The computers do talk to each other, the doc in Leeds hospital saw the results from Harrogate hospital and wants to run them again, but they have to be done in Leeds, for reasons I’m still to fathom, urgently (but not urgentl enough that they can’t keep me waiting for 2 hours plus).

An ALT of 1400 is really high. GP here and happy to manage most stuff away from hospitals. In a patient with a normal ultrasound I’d be concerned.

The messages I think you should be taking away here are 1j there is a reason why people are worried, 2) you are in a stressed system which is on its knees at the moment. 3) surgeons sometimes have to go and do surgery.

The communication thing is poor. I can see the lab results for the 5 closest hospitals from my desk. But I think you should chill out and give them time to work through this. This might be rather important.

‘I can’t see the results’

You should suggest they invest in some more modern equipment, like a fax machine.

Fingers crossed for you dude.

Argh indeed.

Both I and my wife see endocrine at St Mary’s in Manchester because they have particular specialists. We have to take paper copies of our blood tests because Manchester and Stockport Trusts systems don’t talk to each other. Distance between hospitals is about 5 miles.

Cougar – Moderator

‘I can’t see the results’

You should suggest they invest in some more modern equipment, like a fax machine.

Fingers crossed for you dude. [/quote]

Not allowed quite rightly as its not secure. Faxing completely banned in the Scots NHS years ago. We can use email but patient data can only be sent to an NHS email address

I know it’s important and needs to be done, I guess I’m just annoyed that they’ve rung up saying I need to drop everything and get there ASAP, to then be kept waiting 3 hours and counting.

For a blood test.

Fingers crossed for you dude.

+1

Stay well Tom.

Yeah it’s sometimes makes no sense at all.

And, at 130am, I’ve been let out… blood levels are the same as they were yesterday.

Wow, that must be messing with your head, hope they can get to the bottom of it and sort you out. I guess a good night’s sleep would be handy too. Get Well Soon.

Hope things get worked out Tom.

Mrs_OAB has some fancy pants blood issues*. The number of times we have had consultant hematologists and immunologists say to us ‘I can tell you exactly what your results are. Why? I have not a clue…’ I get the feeling that (like other areas of medicine) blood is a really complex thing.

Most of the time it is just her body and blood interacting with minor illness, viruses etc. Each time can cause faff for all involved, stress for us and NHS significant costs. However on the three occasions it has been more serious, I am so grateful they have been fussy over tests and check-ins with consultants or community nurses.

Let us know how you get on.

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*Primary Immune Deficiency / Common Variable Immune Disorder

I understand that you’re frustrated, but the way I read it suggests that you’ve had fantastic service (bar one hospital / lab not talking to another).

The Dr could just phone the lab that did the test and get a verbal result over the phone and a copy printed and posted to put in your records.

(I appreciate that’s not very helpful to you right now!)

The doc did have the results, it seems he just wasn’t looking in the right place/wasn’t expecting me to have had them done in Harrogate.

The things I’m annoyed about.
Being told i needed to get there urgently, then it taking 3 1/2 hours to see anyone other than the receptionist.

That I had to go to a surgical assessment unit for a blood test. I could have had that done anywhere. (I know that if the bloods had thrown up an issue then I’d be in the right place, but the previous two test showed they were stable plus the last time they admitted me, it was just for observation, and was given no treatment)

On having the blood test, having to wait another 4 hours for the results, meaning it being 130am before I left

The main reason this has annoyed me is because I know it can work much better than this, and have experienced it working better, albeit in other NHS trusts/hospitals.

The positives are I can have the next round of bloods done in Harrogate (doc said so) and doesn’t have to be for a couple of days, assuming I don’t turn yellow in the mean time

Glad the results were normal.

Yes it can be better than that.

Not normal, still elevated ALT, just stable.

I can understand your frustration but it also makes more sense to have a person waiting around just wasting their own time than have gaps with no one around to treat so wasting the NHS’s time. Must also be a nightmare trying to schedule things accurately when the various resources (nurses, doctors, test equipment, labs etc.) are dynamically allocated based primarily on urgency/criticality not how long someone’s already been waiting

Sounds frustrating, but at least you’re being looked after.

Just by the by, I was born and, about 10 years later, nearly died in St James’s! 10 year old me found it very frustrating waiting for bloods to come back before they let me go (had to have 2 pints of blood to get my levels high enough for them to let me go, I’d been about to leave post surgery when the bleed became evident) 🙂