Merlin What&;#063;

It all began in 1974 when I was living in a small town in the
northwest of Ireland with my wife, two small children, a mortgage and a
car loan. The first symptom I had was a pain in my left arm. It didn't
take long for several other joints to become infected. My GP thought it
was most likely to be rheumatoid arthritis but made me an appointment
to see a consultant.
"A rheumatologist?" I asked.
"No," he replied, "but he knows more about it than me."
"Oh," I said and accepted the appointment, which happened to be on the
Good Friday of that year.

The consultant gave me an examination, which lasted all of ten minutes
and then announced that he would like me hospitalised to do some tests.
"But," he explained, "I haven't got a bed available at the moment. And
I'm not likely to have one for at least a month. You wouldn't happen to
have any private medical insurance, would you?" I announced that I had.
When he'd satisfied himself that I had enough treatment and maintenance
units to cover whatever he had in mind, he arranged for my admittance
on the following Monday - Easter Monday! Then charged me ten pounds
"cash, please" for his trouble.

So, I went into hospital and he went on holiday for a few days. This
was the first time I had been in hospital as a private patient.
Believing I was entitled to all the perks of that position, when two
nurses entered my room on the first morning and told me I had to get up
if I wanted breakfast, I refused to move. Instead of bowing to my
insistence that as a private patient I was entitled to breakfast in
bed, they threatened to pour a jug of water over me, if I didn't shift
quick, so that they could change the bed. I stood my ground, or lay on
my sheet, whichever way you look at it. True to her word, the more
aggressive of the two poured the best part of a litre of water over my
head. I vacated the room, clutching my dressing gown and uttering
threats of retribution under patients' rights. This only served to fuel
their amusement further and I could hear them laughing all the way to
the dining area.

After two weeks of me lounging around, it was established that I had
got rheumatoid arthritis. There followed a period of three years in
which every sort of pill, potion and remedy was tried, from steroids to
cortisone and gold injections. This treatment was used in conjunction
with all sorts of physiotherapy including dipping my hands in hot wax
and having ultra-sound treatment to my knees (which required me to
drive a forty-four mile round trip into Sligo General Hospital three
times a week). But all to no avail. Despite everything, the progression
of the disease accelerated, and centred on my knee joints. Amongst
other traditional remedies, a well-meaning friend gave me poteen to rub
into the affected joints. I discovered that taking it internally had a
much more desirable effect.

Quite a heavy volume could be written on the administration of the gold
injections alone. The procedure was for me to buy the preparation from
the local pharmacy, then pay my GP to inject it into my rump. The first
time I took the dosage to the doctor I was horrified to see him select
a suitable syringe needle from a collection he kept doused in Dettol in
a Castella cigar tin. One by one, he would take out the needles and
hold them up to the light. When he had selected one that wasn't too
blunt or too bent, he would attach it to the plunger and load the
mixture. I would then have to drop my trousers. He would tear a page
from his prescription pad and smear it with Dettol, before using it as
a swab. On some occasions his selected needle would be so blunt, I
feared he would have to employ a lump hammer to drive it into my
flesh.

As the surgery was adjacent to the factory where I worked, I would just
nip out for my treatment. If the waiting room were crowded, I would try
to return when the rush had subsided. On one such occasion, seeing the
mob waiting for treatment, I was about to duck out when the doctor
caught me and showed me through to his consultation room in front of
everybody else. He then asked me to have a look at his electric fire,
which, he said had "blown up". We came to an agreement; I fixed his
fire and, on that occasion, he injected my arse for free in lieu of
payment.

I was told at each appointment with my consultant that I could slow
down the progression of the disease by using my joints as little as
possible (pretty difficult for someone who earned his living as an
electrician!). This advice would cost me between ten and twenty pounds
each time it was given (not exactly petty cash in the 70s). My
assertion that if I didn't go to work I would not be able to afford the
medical fees, seemed to fall on deaf ears.

I lived close enough to where I worked so that, under normal
circumstances, I was able to take my lunch breaks at home. But my
impaired mobility slowed me to the point where I would still be making
my way home while colleagues were returning to work. I did overcome
this problem by using my car to drive the short distance.
However, the joints eventually deteriorated to the extent that my
consultant decided to refer me to a surgeon.

"An orthopaedic surgeon?" I asked.
"Of course - what else?" came the bemused reply.
"Oh, just checking." I remembered shrugging.

The outcome of the consultation with the surgeon concluded that the
only way I was going to get on my feet again was to have both my knee
joints replaced. The surgery was undertaken at Merlin Park Hospital,
Co. Galway (over sixty-five miles from where I lived in Tubbercurry,
Co. Sligo).

Merlin Park had been built in the 1950s as a T.B. sanatorium. The
complex was made up of a main surgical block and several smaller
convalescence units, scattered around rambling grounds of landscaped
lawns and gardens. To indicate the perspective; the main block was a
mile drive from the perimeter gates.

When I first drove that mile I had no idea that I would be spending
most of the summer in that 'park' (in fact, a total of nine weeks; six
with the first leg and three with the second, separated by a month of
rehabilitation at home).

Most of my time at Merlin Park was taken up with physiotherapy
following surgery, getting the knee joints to bend in and work the way
I needed them to. The first task I was given, once I was up on elbow
crutches following the second operation, was to get twenty Silk Cut and
a box of matches for an elderly nurse. These were available from a
shop/general store - part of the hospital complex (imagine having an
outlet for fags on a hospital site in this day and age!). I passed this
test with flying colours and so was allowed a free hand (or foot) to
roam the grounds at will.

On one fateful day, while on one of my walkabouts, I passed a private
room, which was doubling as the nurses' changing room. I suppose it was
because there wasn't a lot of traffic passed the floor to ceiling glass
doors on the outside wall that nobody had bothered to draw the blinds.
So, as I passed I was unfortunate enough to glimpse in just as a rather
attractive young nurse had stripped down to her underwear (on
reflection, I have seen much worse sights in my life). Our eyes met and
it was a tossup as to who was the most embarrassed. I scuttled passed
as fast as I could.

Later on in the afternoon I was lying relaxing on my bed, when the same
young nurse came to do observations on me. She took my temperature and
blood pressure then removed a felt tipped pen from her pocket and moved
to the end of the bed. Thinking she intended to perform some sort of
reflex test, I took no exception to her grabbing one of my feet and
running the pen over the sole. It was only when I realised it was
taking far longer than I would have expected and she carried out the
same procedure on the second foot that I became first suspicious, then
alarmed, especially when she declared, "That'll teach ye to be ogling
me when I'm in me undies."
As my limbs were not quite up to practicing yoga, I had to get a fellow
patient to hold a mirror at the foot of the bed for me to examine the
damage: Bugs Bunny on one foot, Daffy Duck on the other.

My consultant did his rounds on Wednesdays. Tuesday was the day of an
alternative consultant, who carried out his consultations with his
patients in front of all and sundry in the main day room. I recall
being horrified when, on one occasion, he told a patient that if his
compound fracture didn't heal within the next three weeks, the leg
would have to come off. For the subtlety he used, he might as well have
taken both legs off the unfortunate man there and then. The poor bloke
was absolutely devastated. I felt awful for merely witnessing the
encounter, but I didn't have long to dwell on it:

The following day my surgeon set my release date for the coming weekend
(as that would be the first available time for a neighbour to provide
transport). However a nurse approached me later in the day with the
news that, if I was interested in having a lift, an ambulance was
taking another patient to Sligo General that evening. It took me all of
three minutes to get my things together.

My fellow passenger in the ambulance was a middle-aged woman whom,
although her destination was Sligo General, I reckoned, needed
specialist psychiatric care. She did nothing but rant and rave from the
moment the engine started, until the driver stopped at a remote pub and
bought her a quarter bottle of brandy. The next delay was due to a herd
of cattle straying onto the road. The driver waited patiently for what
seemed an eternity for them to allow us through. Finally, in
desperation, he switched on the twin-tones and the flashing lights to
clear the way. One beast, taking exception to being hassled, gave the
side of the vehicle one almighty kick that all but shook me off my
seat. Such was the ferocity of the blow; it almost woke the sleeping
maniac - that would have been all we needed!

It must have been around eleven o'clock when the ambulance assistant
finally escorted me up the path to my front door. My unexpected arrival
brought Gail out of her bed. If she was pleased to see me it was
nothing to the way I felt to be home at last.