07/10/19 (2)

That turned into quite a long day. Obvious as soon as I got up that the radiotherapy-related "bone pain" wasn't any better, and it quickly got worse through the morning. Part of the trouble is that it isn't just the bone pain I've been warned to expect, it's just as much muscle & soft tissue pain around the joint. And that's what was taking my mobility right back to where it was a couple of weeks ago. A slightly depressing business... Anyway, prescribed myself a first 5ml shot of Oramorph before heading to the hospital, and that both seemed to help and re-focused my attention on the bone pain rather than the soft tissues. But that's bounced backwards and forwards several times since then. No more Oramorph - I do want to keep that for emergency use only, not routine. I'm on continuous low-dose morphine sulphate tablets anyway.

We got to the appointment and Dr.Ch confirmed that it is almost certainly the delayed reaction to the radiotherapy and should fade away over the next few days. I just hope so! He advises giving the hip plenty of rest, which I shall do diligently..The other side-effects were dismissed as "just steroids", apart from the fruit juice taste one which seemed new to him. We went through the chemo plans again, starting on the 16th as long as the current issue is cleared up by then. Apart from the chemo drugs themselves (Velcade / bortezomib, Thalidomide, Dexamethasone) I'll be getting two different antibiotics, an anti-viral, an anti-gout medication (!), and a stack of anti-nausea anti-emetics, antidiarrhoea and anti-constipation medicines in case of need. And, afterwards, yet another antibiotic and something else that I've lost track of. Is that a third seven-day pill-box that I see coming over the horizon?

Then "over the road" at Springfield to the Chemotherapy Suite in the Oncology Centre for my second Zometa perfusion. That's the "bone-strengthening" bisphosphonate that's meant to offset the undesirable effects of the steroids. An interesting comparison with the first one at Broomfield where they're under the greater pressures of the NHS. There, they went straight in with a canula in the big vein in my left elbow, hooked up the drip, let it run twenty minutes then took it all out and goodbye till next time (apart from a cup of tea and a biscuit). All very pleasantly done, but a bit production-line and no time to waste.
At Springfield, they started off by warming my right arm up with a heat pad for easier canulisation while taking time to explain why they think it's so much better to go into a wrist vein rather than an elbow one. While that was going on the coffee and biscuits arrived. then they flushed the line through with a bag of saline to make sure all OK before switching over to the Zometa and then another saline flush afterwards. The whole process took something over an hour, as against half an hour at most.
































We stopped off for a light (and late) lunch at a Costa in Chelmsford, got home ,and I just about crashed out, apart from cooking dinner, until about 21:00. Sleep deprivation catching up, but not with enough decent sleep to make up for it. Maybe tonight...