Move to Romsey
Yesterday they got the news that a room was free in Romsey Hospital for me to have rehab. This is less than ideal as there are no public transport links between here and home (a problem I had while at school when most of my friends lived this side of Eastleigh making it impossible to see them out of school hours) It would take a minimum of three and a half hours and three changes of buses and trains for D and C to get here, all for about half an hour with me. Considering a bus journey of three quarters of an hour is really too much for D I shan't be seeing them again before I get out. We did manage to get a few minutes together yesterday, D had an outpatient appointment at Southampton and snuck off after it to come and see me just before they took me away.
The hospital is light and airy and the staff pleasant and polite. There are eight beds in the ward but the layout is not designed to make things easy for the patients. Worst is the fact that the bedframes are too low for the table to slide under which means that you cannot sit up in bed to eat (or in my case comfortably watch Netflix on my tablet). There is free Freeview TV but they all have the same remote so changing channel can change everybody else's as well! This is why most people leave them turned off at the wall although the man who watches most is supposed to be going home today so I might be able to watch Gotham on a larger screen this week, particularly if I wait for the+1 showing at 10:00.
There is free internet but it censors what you can access. It considers a lot of sites'naughty' and won't give me access to many of the webcomics I follow or things like D's LJ because they are obviously pornographic! (No I wasn't trying to read Oglaf.) Also, this morning it won't accept the password it gave me last night. (Usual problems with that too- we will send you a password so you can log in, we will send it by email, we will not let you access your emails until you log into the internet, to log in you need a password, we will send...) Looks like I'm back to using data for the foreseeable future, good job my tablet thinks it's a smartphone.
The food is good, supposedly better than the General, but they have no idea of the carb contents of the meals. As my blood sugars are frequently low having to guess how much insulin to take is not ideal. Even when I get food that I know that value of (a slice of buttered toast has a carb value of between 15 and 20) they don't provide enough for my minimum dose of insulin to work on. Last night I was given fish fingers and beans - practically no carbs. A handful of chips (which other patients had with theirs) would have made for a more balanced meal. There was also a cup of grey liquid which the staff thought might have been vegetable soup (although noone would hazard a guess as to what vegetables) but as I only found this when I was halfway through my jelly and ice-cream I gave it a miss. I can order meals for myself now so hopefully this side of things will be improving.
My biggest concern is the shower room. This has a toilet,sink and large shower that can take a seated patient and helper. Like every other disabled/hospital washroom I have used it has an emergency pull cord by the toilet in case help is needed. It does not have one within reach of the shower! If you were to fall in the shower you would need to crawl to the screen and open it (not the easiest of jobs when standing) then crawl the length of the room to raise the alarm.
The doctor I saw last night was concerned that I might have a mild infection starting in the wounds on my legs and has prescribed antibiotics. The scars are very tight and a bit red and quite painful when I move. Other than this the higher chairs/toilets etc make it a lot easier to stand up providing that I haven't been sat too long so that my hip seizes up.
On the plus side there is a Pokémon Go gym in range of the ward although Pokémon themselves are fewer than at the General. That said I want to go home but still have no idea how long they intend to keep me.
The hospital is light and airy and the staff pleasant and polite. There are eight beds in the ward but the layout is not designed to make things easy for the patients. Worst is the fact that the bedframes are too low for the table to slide under which means that you cannot sit up in bed to eat (or in my case comfortably watch Netflix on my tablet). There is free Freeview TV but they all have the same remote so changing channel can change everybody else's as well! This is why most people leave them turned off at the wall although the man who watches most is supposed to be going home today so I might be able to watch Gotham on a larger screen this week, particularly if I wait for the+1 showing at 10:00.
There is free internet but it censors what you can access. It considers a lot of sites'naughty' and won't give me access to many of the webcomics I follow or things like D's LJ because they are obviously pornographic! (No I wasn't trying to read Oglaf.) Also, this morning it won't accept the password it gave me last night. (Usual problems with that too- we will send you a password so you can log in, we will send it by email, we will not let you access your emails until you log into the internet, to log in you need a password, we will send...) Looks like I'm back to using data for the foreseeable future, good job my tablet thinks it's a smartphone.
The food is good, supposedly better than the General, but they have no idea of the carb contents of the meals. As my blood sugars are frequently low having to guess how much insulin to take is not ideal. Even when I get food that I know that value of (a slice of buttered toast has a carb value of between 15 and 20) they don't provide enough for my minimum dose of insulin to work on. Last night I was given fish fingers and beans - practically no carbs. A handful of chips (which other patients had with theirs) would have made for a more balanced meal. There was also a cup of grey liquid which the staff thought might have been vegetable soup (although noone would hazard a guess as to what vegetables) but as I only found this when I was halfway through my jelly and ice-cream I gave it a miss. I can order meals for myself now so hopefully this side of things will be improving.
My biggest concern is the shower room. This has a toilet,sink and large shower that can take a seated patient and helper. Like every other disabled/hospital washroom I have used it has an emergency pull cord by the toilet in case help is needed. It does not have one within reach of the shower! If you were to fall in the shower you would need to crawl to the screen and open it (not the easiest of jobs when standing) then crawl the length of the room to raise the alarm.
The doctor I saw last night was concerned that I might have a mild infection starting in the wounds on my legs and has prescribed antibiotics. The scars are very tight and a bit red and quite painful when I move. Other than this the higher chairs/toilets etc make it a lot easier to stand up providing that I haven't been sat too long so that my hip seizes up.
On the plus side there is a Pokémon Go gym in range of the ward although Pokémon themselves are fewer than at the General. That said I want to go home but still have no idea how long they intend to keep me.
