The large box file is filling up with papers, the medication box is filling up with medicines and we are both getting cranky - Philip with pain which is proving very difficult to manage and me with fatigue and a peripheral neuropathy/arthritis flare-up in my hands.
For Philip, his three Friday activities - morning swim-cum-spa, walk to the shops with a friend visiting from Melbourne and then a visit to the GP to renew scripts - was over-ambitious and he paid for it in pain and exhaustion. It seems that Browning/Andrea del Sarto's advice, that "a man's reach should exceed his grasp", is not the way to go. (Who else remembers that poem from school days?)
On Friday night I tried to get the locum service CALMS only to get an engaged signal, while the National Home Doctor Service took our booking but later - after more phone calls - told me that the area doctor had closed his books, However Saturday morning I tried the National Home Doctor Service again and struck lucky: a doctor who locumed from Sydney at weekends and who had worked in palliative care and so was across pain management. He upped the baseline medication of Jurnista (morphine) and Lyrica (nerve blocker) to be supplemented p.r.n. by the liquid form of Jurnista, Diluaudid, popularly known as 'happy juice'.
Have updated the meds spreadsheet to show the new schedule, which includes an antibiotic for skin rash from Tarceva and.an antinausea tablet before meals (optimistically so called).
This doctor diagnosed the new nerve pain up and down Philip's right leg as coming from L4 and L5 vertebrae. We have yet to find out the significance of this. Will ring first thing on Tuesday to discuss it but it might need hard evidence in the form of imaging - not scheduled until 2 May - and then possibly more radiation??
We are getting quite an overview of the ACT medical system. So far the clinicians Philip has seen include: GP, consultant physician, hospital registrar, oncologist, pathology technician, radiographer, radiologist, pharmacist, nurse practitioners in pain management, cancer care coordination and palliative care and no doubt others which don't come immediately to mind. Luckily these are not 100% in their own little silos, there is an attempt at wholistic treatment. Unlike in the mental health area.
Our solar electricity installation is working well and today's sunshine powered clothes washing, dishwasher, ironing and blender. I intend registering interest in the new government-subsidised trial for battery storage as the installer we used for the PV panels is one of the three companies selected for the trial.
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