A trip to the E.R.

My plan was to clean house yesterday and write a blog entry in the evening. My plans derailed around 5 p.m.

I was home alone, cleaning my little heart out. Apparently literally, because I kept getting little twinges in my chest. I ignored it and kept on cleaning, using copious amounts of Lime-Away in the bathtub. We have terribly hard water.

By 5 p.m., I could no longer ignore the twinges in my chest and I started trying to figure out what was going on. I was also having some trouble breathing.

Bet you know where this is headed.

I sat down at the computer and typed in "heart" and "women" and there were some symptoms similar to what I was feeling.

Spots danced before my eyes. I thought I might faint. I grabbed the phone and called my mother-in-law, who isn't far away. No one was home.

So I called my husband at the firestation, and told him I was not feeling well. He arranged to leave and come home.

He came in, said I looked flushed, and drove me to the E.R.

Now, the E.R. at Carilion in Roanoke is under construction. I have no idea how long this has been going on, but there is no place to park and assist a passenger. All my husband could do was let me out. A graying security guard came to the car. "You having chest pains, ma'am?" he asked, and he escorted me to a wheelchair. Then he rolled me into the ER while husband went to park the car.

The security guard handed me over to a nurse, who wheeled me past my husband's EMS crew, who was there delivering a patient. "Oh, hi Mrs. X," said a surprised medic that I knew. I waved weakly.

Then I sat in admissions and waited on them to make sure I was who I said I was. The medic followed and after talking to me briefly, he helpfully went off in search of a tank of oxygen. Husband appeared and stayed with me, as did the medic for a while. It kind of confused the nurses I think because they thought I'd been brought in by ambulance.

Then it was off to "triage" where a nurse took my vitals. Temp, 98.2. Blood pressure, 163 over 112 or something, it was high. I was also shaking, in part from cold, and from nerves. Hospitals are not nice places to be.

Then it was back to admissions. I did not wait in the waiting room; they whisked me to a room. They ran an EKG quickly, and it was normal. This was done by attaching several pieces of adhesive with metal on them and running lines to them. Since I appeared to be not in trouble, I was left alone for a very long time. Husband sat with me.

The nursing assistant wanted to start an IV, but he could not find my veins so I asked him to cease his efforts. I have terrible veins. Eventually the doctor came in, and he spoke with me and asked my history. Grandfather died of a heart attack at age 56; he was the only one I know of with heart trouble. That was in 1976, New Year's Day. Who knows if he'd have lived it hadn't been a holiday.

The doctor decided to run blood tests and do a chest X-ray. A male nurse came around with a portable machine and did the chest X-ray. Then another nurse came and put in an IV to take blood, and left the IV in there, of course. She did manage to find a vein in my arm; in the past they put it in the back of my hand and my hand turned black from the bruise.

Anyway, the blood work came back fine for the cardio enzymes, whatever they are, but my white cell count was high. I don't have an infection that I know of.

Meanwhile, the chest pain had gone completely away. Even so, the nurse was offering me nitroglycerine. I declined.

The doctor said he spoke with my family physician. She thought I was a good candidate for a cardio watch, or something like that. I have seen my GP all of twice, she is a new doctor for me as mine retired in January. She doesn't really know me.

The E.R. doctor said they would monitor me and run a stress test on me in the morning and then I could go home. Okay. Up we go to this special "non admittance" 23-hour heart observation area.

As I settled in, a nurse told me I would be monitored and in the morning they'd give me the nuclear test. Then it would be an eight-hour wait, and they'll do it again.

Wait, I said. What is this nuclear test? Well, they inject radioactive stuff in you and it gives them a great picture of your heart. It's the best test.

I don't want anything injected in me, I said. Can't we just do a walk on the treadmill and be done with it?

Well, you get to do that, too, the nurse said. It's part of the test.

She called my GP back, who was insistent that I get this nuclear thing. I didn't want anything injected in me. The nurse even brought up the lady who does the nuclear test. The nuclear testing lady got rather upset with me, I think. She said, "It's just a little radiation, it's no worse than say an upper GI series," and my response was along the line of, "you're still putting something radioactive in my body."

Husband did not want me to have that test, either. Neither his father nor his uncle have fared well with it. So finally I said, I want to go home, and the nurse called the ER doctor, who said everything else looked good, let her go.

And here I am. My chest still feels a little tight and I did not sleep well, even though it was 1 a.m. by the time we got back home and in bed.

My personal unprofessional diagnosis? Asthma. We already know I have that. I was using a lot of chemicals to clean, and messing in dust, and I'd been outside to take pretty pictures, and the ragweed is everywhere.

It doesn't feel like a normal asthma attack, but I also am taking a different asthma medication, which I think has changed things somewhat.

I will follow up with my GP, who will probably be unhappy with me for not doing the "nuclear" thing. But I don't trust the medical establishment to do what is best for me. I fear all they really care about is their bottom line.