Under Pressure?

My thoughts go out to the people of Christchurch, who were rattled again yesterday. It must be a very tense period for the populace. After the last big jolt in February, Auckland DHB's took around 80 dialysis patients due to problems with the water supply, and damage to infrastructure. How on earth they coped with the additional load, without any change to the normal routine of the exisiting patients, is beyond my comprehension. I understand that extra shifts were put on for the Christchurchians, amd we all coped marvellously.

Now moving swiftly on to dialysis news.......last Friday evening my nurse suggested we try to modify the regulated fluid retrieval and delivery system to see whether my blood pressure would remain stable at the end of the session, instead of it plummeting faster than Phill Goffs approval ratings. Normally my blood pressures start failtry high at around 160/90, and then slowly drift downwards before a final slump at the end of my 4 hours, leaving my dizzy and unsteady (No, I am not normally as dizzy as you may think), with pressures of below 100 or even 90/70!
As a result I have to sit like a cat in a catshow being examined and repeatedly checked by the nurses every few minutes until my blood pressure comes back above 100, and then hey presto I am released back into the community.
So my Friday attendant Raj, set the machine to take 3 litres of fluid off in the first hour, and then in the last 3 hours gently takes the remaining 500 mils, with me plateauing at around 115 for the last hour. Brilliant! No wobbles whatsoever.

I asked last nights nurse whether she could do the same, but rather like a disorientated carrier pigeon she was unsure of where she was going with this,  so we reverted to the usual method, and lo and behold, after 4 hours I was dizzy again...

Thank you Raj, it's great to see that sometimes in life its fantastic to have pressure!