Sense and Sensibility

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a politician in need of votes, will make a song and dance about their support for the NHS. Frequently this means a junior MP doing what I call the 'I support the NHS' dance on Parliament Green. This involves frantic movement from one broadcaster to another, head bobbing in a desperate attempt to catch attention. In reality, it achieves nothing. The voter doesn't believe them. Probably with good reason. 

It simply underlines their irrelevance. 

Now I am a fan of the NHS,  so when my work insurance said that they wouldn't pay beyond diagnosis, I was fairly chilled, arranged an appointment and on the agreed day set off with the wife. She had finally had enough of trying to extract the required information from me, muttered something about blood from a stone, and decided instead to go with me to the source.

In my defence, I wasn't deliberately being awkward, it was simply that I didn't ask the questions she wanted answers to, so I had nothing to tell her. On reflection, I can understand her frustration. I really should have asked those questions. It wasn't difficult.

She had, after all, gone to the effort of giving me a list.

Anyway, I arrived for my appointment, hunted out Neurology, checked in with the slightly flustered nurse at reception and waited. There was no decent coffee, the seats were uncomfortable and the wait was long. The NHS doesn't waste money on fripperies. Eventually, the Consultant appeared and introduced himself and we toddled off to his room.

He had the notes from my private consultant but said he wanted to redo some of the tests.

Which was great. As I have previously said I was somewhat underwhelmed by the rigour of the tests to date, so looked forward to what I hoped would be a more thorough investigation. Which it was, just.

Most of it was the same, drawing spirals, jazz hands whilst rapidly pressing fingers tips together, walking up and down the room, with the limited addition of tuning forks and walking backwards down a long corridor. The tuning forks weren't used to check my ability to recognise musical notes. Which is just as well as I am tone deaf. They were given a sharp rap and then pressed against my leg. I will confess that to this day I have no idea what he learned from that

Once he was satisfied that the tests were complete, he immediately confirmed the diagnosis. At least he had the good grace to show sympathy and not appear delighted with the result! He told me that we would have 6 monthly meetings so that he could monitor the progression of my disease, detailed in broad terms what the next 15 to 20 years would be like, and then went through the medication options.

Neurologists in the UK are a rare species, we simply don't have enough. So shortly after our meeting, he left to go elsewhere. This meant that my six monthly meetings didn't happen and I went 18 months without seeing a Consultant at all.

However, I did see my assigned NHS Parkinson's nurse. But this wasn't at the nice, newly refurbished hospital, this was at what appeared to be a WW2-era building, which was only just managing to stay up, due to the stiffening supplied by multitudes of coats of paint. I was given another check-up, very different from the ones I had previously been given and asked some new questions;

"Do you have constipation?" No

"Do you have incontinence" No

"Are you sure" Yes

"Not even a little leak" No, not even a little leak

All the while, rapidly, manically even, bending either one or other of my legs, almost as if hoping to provoke "A little leak".

Well IF that is what she was wanting, I left her disappointed. My dignity intact, head held high.

I was advised that there could be no regular appointments and that she was very busy and overworked, which I could easily believe, there isn't a lot of 'fat' in the NHS. But if I needed her, to e-mail and she would get back to me as soon as she could. She has kept her word.

Then Corvid happened. And our world started to crumble, Governments behaved like headless chickens, people died and the Chinese Government sent specially trained killers to eliminate anyone who used the term 'Chinese Virus' or 'Wuhan flu'. Or maybe they didn't, I might be exaggerating. And in effect, with a few exceptions, the NHS was closed down to all but those suffering from Covid. You had more chance of finding the Fountain of Youth than you did getting a GP during the pandemic.

And my mother died. As a direct result of her stubbornness and the refusal of her GP to give her a proper check-up. Covid found many allies, even if only unintentionally.

Our MP's queued up to do their 'I support the NHS' dance on Parliament green and the rest of us stood at the door on a Thursday evening clapping our admiration for the nurses and doctors. Well, I didn't, the whole clapping thing left me cold and I've never been good at bending the knee to pointless social virtue signalling and I wasn't going to do it then either. Especially after I read of people being threatened or treated as community outcasts for taking a similar stand. However, for some, the race to prove their 'virtue' meant that clapping wasn't enough and so in the early days before they all got bored, some let off fireworks, blasted on a musical instrument or banged like a mad thing on a pan. 

More noise means greater righteousness after all.

Since the NHS took control of my treatment, I should have had seven appointments with a neurologist, I've had two. For me, this isn't such a concern, I'm early stage, I just hope that those with more advanced PD and therefore with more complicated health issues are being better treated.

I don't blame the NHS or even the politicians. It's difficult to justify the level of spending that would be required to ensure that Hospitals continue as normal through a pandemic like Covid. a once every hundred years event.

That's not to say that there weren't aspects of how the pandemic has been handled, that needs a critical review. But there are plenty of better opportunities for blaming our MP's if that's your thing.

And some of the PD community had to self-isolate and suffer the feeling of loneliness that went with it. This was a real problem, as loneliness and social isolation was already part of the life of many Parkinson's patients. Like so many other sections of society, it will have worsened the existing problem with PD and mental health issues. This combination of reduced mobility and increased psychological stress may have worsened the disease and possibly accelerated its progression.

Perhaps selfishly, there is one piece of good news. On my last visit to the consultant, I did a cognitive and memory test as a check for early signs of dementia. I passed with 100%. Since I have found out that I now have a heightened risk of dementia, I have worried about that above all other possible future symptoms.

I felt good.

But as my memory has always been poor, I did find it a bit odd.