Finally......after nearly year, and telling several Health Care Professionals about my very bad cough and other symptoms, I finally got this diagnosis and - more important, treatment.
Easter 2023 and I had a very bad time with bronchitus. Felt extremely ill for three or four weeks. Even felt this was going to finish me off. My two eldest daughters who nursed me through it (more or less), were far more pragmatic - pointing out that three weeks is the normal time for bronchitus and at my age (in my eighties) I should such illnesses to take their time.
I did recover, but never fully, insofar as I was extraordinary tired for much of the time, and the cough that had always come when I was tired was with me most of the time. This was a deep throated cough, and as well as being debilitating, was very embarrassing. I mentioned the tiredness and cough to my GP and to the nurses whom I saw for my annual medication check up. 'Well, at your age....' summed up their responses.
Asked for referral to a Sleep clinic, as I was showing several signs of Sleep Apnoea. Evidently my local Health Authority stopped these referrals b the simple expedient of not permitting anyone with a BMI above 30 to be referred. Very unusual to find someone with a BMI below 30 suffering from Sleep Apnoea!!!!!)
My eldest daughter visiting me for a few days a few weeks ago was alarmed when I would fall asleep in my wheelchair whilst waiting for a few minutes, knows her way round the NHS having been employed by them for over thirty years sent a complaint about my lack of treatment.
Within days I was called in to my GP practice with an appointment with the Senior Partner there. He actually really listened to what I was telling him (backed up by No. 2 daughter who I took with), examined me and diagnosed this sleep variant asthma. Started me off with a five day course of steroids - which acted like a miracle. By day 3 that cough was gone!!! Steroid tabs finished he then put me on a strong steroid nasal powder to be used daily.
A month later I can honestly say I now feel as I had before I had that bronchitus a year ago. Cough gone, sleeping better without the snorts and snoring I have been doing all of the time, therefore not falling asleep every time I sit down.
Evidently this is a lesser known type of asthma, but surely should have been picked up in less than twelve months. Delighted that I am now in receipt of successful treatment but feel chagrined (to say the least) that without my daughter's intervention this would have just continued, being put down to a problem of ageing.
34 year old assisted euthanasia
