Colleague of mine has been suffering from swollen joints and stiffness for some time. His GP ordered bloods and ruled out RA. He was referred to an NHS rheumatologist who he saw last Friday. He had CXR and xrays of hands and feet.

This morning,he received a phone call, out of the blue, from the CT department at the hospital. He is to have a scan next Wednesday. This is a very fast turnround and he is duly worried. He’d heard nothing from his GP prior to this phone call.

Is there anything I can say to stop him thinking about lung cancer (he’s never smoked) or mesothelioma (he worked with asbestos 20 years ago).

He’s 38.

Perhaps they’ve had a cancellation next Wednesday and he was the first name they picked out of the hat.

I had a CT on my knee – time from referral to the actual scan was pretty short iirc – only a week or two.

They seem to run them 24/7 – so I guess that means there’s more opportunity for ‘gaps’ etc. I ended up going in at 8pm on Wednesday evening or soemthing for mine.

We had fairly long waiting times for MR so made a concentrated effort to get waiting times down. By changing some working practices and adjusting shift patterns a bit we did just that. However, we also found that waiting times of less than week for routine examinations don’t actually work because we then get a large number of DNAs (Did Not Attend) resulting in unused appointment slots. This happens if we send out a letter, the patient receives it a day or two later then has to arrange childcare or time off work at 3 or 4 days notice which can be difficult. As a result, if we have an opening less than week away we will phone the patient so that a – they get the message quickly and we know they have and b – they tell us there and then if the time is suitable so if not we can try someone else. It’s about best use of an expensive asset, and if your friend had something to worry about, I suspect he would be enjoying the view from a scanner right now. Bear in mind thatw e do keep free slots for emergencies so a “right now” case can be seen right now (more or less).

The other way to look at it is that if they thought it was anything urgent they wouldnt wait a week !

A weeks wait doesn’t seem at all urgent to me.

His consultant rheumatologist has just called him and told him he has enlarged lymph glands in his chest.

It’s natural to panic, especially with his work history. However, it’s worth pointing out to him that there are a number of reasons for swollen lymph glands, including occasionally rheumatoid arthritis, and while it’s important to rule out other, more sinister explanations, it could be as simple as him having an infection at the moment.

I think he’d be happy to settle for sarcoidosis (Gregory House’s fave DD) given some of the other possibilities.

He’s gone out for a chip barm* bless him.

*bap, butty, roll, breadcake, stottie etc…..