Thursday 28 June 2018

POTS




On Monday I went to see a Cardiologist for a two year follow up appointment. When I relapsed over two years ago I was tested for everything under the sun. I saw pretty much every “ologist” you can think of. One of them was a Cardiologist to rule out any heart problems. 

I had a 24 blood pressure monitoring and a 5 day ECG test. All came back clear thank goodness. The only thing that kept being floated around was POTS.

Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) is a condition where when you change from lying to standing it causes an abnormally large increase in heart rate. A possible reason for my falls.

Of course later I was diagnosed with Atonic Seizures which explained the falls so POTS was put to one side and dismissed.

It has only been brought up to me by one Consultant, last year, who also suggested I had viral meningitis back in 2004 when all this started. His belief was that I have many neurological conditions due to this. Predictably other Consultants disagree. 

Anyway, back to Monday. I fully expected for it to be a complete waste of time and for me to be discharged but instead I was cautiously diagnosed with POTS. This goes alongside my epilepsy and the other 4679379 conditions I have. 

There is medication for POTS but as I’m on a cocktail of drugs already and they have particularly bad effects it was agreed I wouldn’t start anything new. 

The advice was to always keep hydrated and eat more salt. Eat more salt I hear you say?? Yes really. Bring on the McDonald’s! That was what he was saying, wasn’t it?! 

So I say cautiously diagnosed because no doubt next week I’ll get a letter saying it’s not POTS. Did I ever tell you about the time I was diagnosed with psoriatic arthritis for four years before some random rheumatologist came in, looked at me for two minutes, and took the diagnosis away. Now I don’t want arthritis but if I do have it I want the proper treatment for it. That’s been put to one side for now while I deal with my current problems. We’ll come back to that a later date.

Now we don’t know if (a big if) I have POTS what proportion of my falls are seizures and what are POTS. It’s one big guessing game and I’m the little person going round the board while the Consultants play. 

Do you remember the Raggy Dolls? I’d definitely be sent to the reject bin!  It’s a good job I know other raggy dolls who can join me. 

The saga continues...


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