A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Thiranjala Weerasinghe sj.- One Island Two Nations
?????????????????????????????????????????????????Sunday, June 25, 2017
A Hell Of A Ward!
I
have, from time to time, when writing about other issues, dropped in
“vignettes” from my time in a Provincial facility designated as a
“Teaching Hospital.”
Those
remarks made in passing have not been complimentary and might I say at
the outset of this piece, that the criticisms I have made were
understatements rather than hyperbole. The same goes for what follows.
Very
nearly a year has passed since what I am about to recount unfolded and,
certainly, what I am about to commit to this column is after sober
second thought.
Early
in 2016 at the direction of my Cardiologist, I channeled a person who, I
was given to understand, was the only one practicing as a Cardiac
Electro Physiologist in town. I will describe this person hereafter as
CEP #1. I was directed to have a Holter monitoring device fitted, which,
to put it simply, provides a 24-hour long Electro Cardiograph. Despite
the inconvenience of driving into town on two successive evenings, the
first to be fitted with the device and the second to have it taken off
twenty-four hours after its installation and for the results to be
provided to the consultant. I did so. There is another little tale
attached to that adventure with the fitting, taking-off and results
analysis but it can wait for another day!
Shortly
thereafter, I “channeled” CEP #1 to provide an expert analysis of the
results and make appropriate recommendations to my cardiologist.
Thanks
to a memory that, as I approach the four-score mark leaves something to
be desired, I forgot to take the document when I saw this consultant! I
was summarily booted out of the consultation chambers no sooner this
error was discovered! In
retrospect, there was enough time left when my omission was discovered
to have asked me to go home and bring the document to the consultant
before the clinic time ended. But that is hindsight!
A
little chagrined I reported (by SMS ) the state of affairs to my
Consultant who I was scheduled to see in a day or so because he was
leaving the country for a conference of some kind. To my query as to
what could be done in the circumstances, I had a one-word reply –
“Colombo.” Despite my
limited internet skills, I found a Cardiac Electro Physiologist and
travelled down to Colombo at the crack of dawn the next day having
“e-channeled” him and having obtained the services of a driver to take
me to the capital city, my own physical condition precluding my steering
a vehicle for such a long distance – better than a hundred kilometers
each way.
A
very pleasant surprise awaited me! A doctor in the same specialty – CEP
#2 for purposes of this discussion – as the one who had turfed me from
the consultation room in the hill capital, spent about three-quarters of
an hour explaining what ailed me and my future prospects in that
regard. He also gave me a letter of introduction to another Cardiac
Electro Physiologist in the same town.
On
my return, I saw my cardiologist and then channeled the doctor to whom
I’d been given a letter of introduction, for purposes of this narrative
CEP #3. My subsequent visits to him suggested that there were doctors to whom the Hippocratic Oath did matter!
Alas,
he was transferred to another hospital far, far away, but was
considerate enough to give me the name of yet another specialist in his
field in the same jurisdiction, CEP #4 for purposes of this discussion.
Another good relationship had to be terminated as that doctor, too, was transferred to the capital city!
I now had no choice but to return to CEP #1!
Another “Holter” was the first outcome. Then
the determination that I should have a Pacemaker installed followed. I
was informed that this was a very simple procedure, did not require
operating theatre facilities and would be done by the man seated before
me in CEP #1’s Consulting Room. A
side bar here: I have never, in my better than three-score-and-ten
years on this earth, ever had two doctors for the price of one in the
same consultation room unless it was to share complementary expertise
over very difficult problems! And
that is in three continents! However, it was subsequently told that CEP
#1 had a health condition that precluded anything even as physically
non-taxing as a pacemaker installation. Looking at the minion in the
room I inquired, only half facetiously, “Does he know how?” The huffy
response was that he had done “many dozens,” if I remember right, of
these implantations successfully. I had a vague feeling of unease, but
who am I, a mere layman, to dispute the opinion of a specialist in the
cardiac field?
The
next step was the purchase of a Pacemaker at a cost of approximately
Rs. 300,000. There went another term deposit! This had quite a rigmarole
attached to it and required yet another trip to town for the purpose.
Done, and now the big day dawned!
I
went down to the Teaching Hospital and registered myself in the
appropriate ward and the process of preparation for the procedure began.
For
the uninitiated, a Pacemaker is little bigger than a matchbox, if that,
and requires an appropriate-sized incision on either one’s left or
right pectoral muscle to insert it.