Adventures in pandemic healthcare

Hapi watching the goldfish

I'm still sick. Last Monday I called my doctor to make an appointment and the receptionist asked me what my symptoms were. Then she said that two of my symptoms were on the Covid-19 list so I should call 811 to get a test. The earliest appointment she could give me with my doctor was end of October in person or early November by phone. Crazy. I didn't think that I had Covid, but in the spirit of touching all bases I called 811. Twenty minutes later I was talking to a human. The human said, after asking a bunch of questions, that I only had one symptom on the list (headache) and that did not qualify me to be tested (one very serious or two less serious). He also complimented me on the youthful sound of my voice and I said that right about now I sure wasn't feeling very youthful, but thanks anyway. 

The human told me that a public health nurse would call me within 12 hours, which meant anytime before 2.00am. I said I wouldn't be answering the phone after 10.00pm. Apparently public health nurses do actually work 24 hours a day, so a 2.00am call was a real possibility. Fortunately the public health nurse called me around 8.00pm. She asked pretty much the same questions as the first responder to my call and reiterated that I was not eligible for testing. However, she said, she could triage my symptoms if I liked and tell me how to proceed. Sure, why not? 

After a long detailed series of questions she said I needed to see a doctor within 2-3 days. Also, she wanted me to call back my doctor's receptionist to tell her to check the current list of Covid symptoms being tested before referring anyone to 811, and to make sure that my doctor was aware of my symptoms. Since I couldn't get an appointment with my doctor in less than a month, she recommended that I make an appointment at the nearest walk-in clinic. I was surprised by that but she told me that all the walk-in clinics were working on an appointment basis now. 

The two goldfish, one hiding under some debris

After getting off the phone with the nurse I did call the walk-in clinic that evening and someone answered but said there were no appointments available. I was told that I should call back in the morning to make an appointment for later that day. I did that, but it took multiple calls to get through. They don't have a wait queue on the phone, you have to keep calling back until you get a live person. I did that and eventually got through, again I was told that I would be called back by a public health nurse, some time later that day. Since a real appointment was what was on the line, I couldn't afford to miss that call. I cancelled everything that day—it was very warm and I was hoping to go swimming, oh well too bad for me—to wait for that call, which didn't come until around 6.00pm. The nurse questioned me about my purpose in seeing a doctor and then said she'd talk to the doctor about whether he wanted to do a phone or in person appointment. Almost immediately after the doctor called me. He asked a bunch of questions and then said he wanted to do a technique to diagnose vertigo; I should come in and he'd fit me in between other appointments.

So I did, he eventually performed the manoeuvre, but the results were inconclusive. He suggested I get a head CT scan. I reluctantly agreed, thinking that with wait times being what they are I had a couple of months to decide whether I really wanted to do that. No such luck. The very next day I got called about an appointment early in the morning two days later. I was shocked. I asked if it could be postponed, you know, like maybe a few weeks from now? But no, I couldn't do that because the doctor had marked it 'Urgent'. Really? Anyway, I did manage to get her to postpone it to a slightly more reasonable time of the morning another three days later. So tomorrow morning I go for a CT scan.

The next day I called the receptionist to relay the 811 public health nurse's message, she said she'd make sure my doctor was aware of the situation. I went swimming in the afternoon—lately it's been warm enough that the ponds have warmed up considerably—and griped to one of the other swimmers about the amount of radiation involved in a CT scan and the fact that I didn't think it would help in the least. 

She said, You're 70! What do you care? Get the scan!

Swimming this past week has kept me from depression. I feel so wonderful in the water, even if I pay for it later in exhaustion, dizziness and cold, it's worth it. The ponds are cold again, but that brief respite was very good.

So tomorrow a brain scan. I am certain that nothing will show up, but you never know, right? Do I want to know that I have a brain tumour? Not really. Then I would have to decide about treatment or not and it is a very slippery slope. A friend with a brain tumour elected not to get it treated because of the risk that the radiation treatment would do serious damage to her teeth, nose, and/or face. She decided she'd rather live out the rest of her life with the tumour. I am kind of in agreement. The 811 public health nurse didn't think I was having a stroke, I didn't sound confused or hard to understand. And that's pretty much what CT brain scans are good for diagnosing: stroke and tumours.

I have my own ideas about what is wrong with me, and a CT scan won't add any useful information if I'm right. So we shall see what happens next.

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The photos: for 9 years now Hapi and I have been visiting this small pond hidden in the woods behind the university to see the goldfish. The pond used to be the university water well, supplying both drinking water and irrigation water for the university farm that kept the faculty, staff and students fed.  There used to be four goldfish but now there are only two, and those two have grown considerably since we first started watching them, almost a foot long each. One swims near the surface and the other tends to hide lower down, but they both stay as far away from Hapi as they can. Hapi lives in hope that one or both of them will jump into the air for her to catch, but she sure isn't going to jump into the water to hunt them. In the winter their pond freezes over and we don't find out until the spring if they survived. So far they have.