I finally got an appointment to go to HKL today, but not to see the Urologist. I went there to sign a Consent Letter and to get a date for Cass to do an MRU (Magnetic Resonance Urography). The parent needs to sign a Consent Letter as the procedure has some risks tied to it. However, not all patients will experience these side effects. In the past, Cass had gone through MCUG and MAG3 scans that required contrast injected via IV and thank God, she didn’t suffer from any side effects. Hopefully her body will have no issues dealing with the contrast again this time. Fasting is required and besides having contrast injected via IV, Cass MUST NOT move throughout the 1.5 hours inside the MRI tunnel, which emits deafening sounds. Any movement will render the images unclear. Cass had done an MRI before 6 years ago but that was without any contrast injected. The images were not 100% clear. I think the hardest thing about this procedure is not being able to move for 1.5 hours and being strapped and wrapped up like a mummy; not fasting for 8 hours or more.
The Consent Letter:
I was late for almost an hour for my appointment with the Urology Dept nurse as I couldn’t get a Grab driver. None of the Grab drivers wanted to accept a passenger who’s going to HKL, thinking that I must be sick with some suspicious virus. HKL is one of the government hospitals to handle Covid-19 cases besides Hospital Sg Buloh.
I then downloaded the My Car app and finally managed to get a kind driver who came to pick me up. We chatted throughout the ride to the hospital. He went to the wrong building (HKL is really HUGE!) and had to make a detour; I had to pay extra and was terribly late. He told me that he’s now very careful with accepting orders to and fro hospitals; orders to and fro the Sg Buloh Hospital will never be accepted as it’s the centralized hospital for all Covid-19 cases in the Klang Valley. Thank God I managed to get a Grab driver after the appointment some 4 hours later, as the driver had to drop off a doctor at HKL. On both trips, the drivers wore face mask. The My Car driver told me that he has to sanitize his car every 4 hourly and fumigate his car with potent disinfectant once a week.
I wore a mask 😷 throughout my time at HKL; also washed and sanitized my hands umpteen times till my hands now feel like a 100-year old woman’s wrinkled hands.
Hand sanitizer located on every floor and at the lift areas:
From the Specialist Centre at HKL, I had to walk under the sizzling hot sun to the Women & Children Hospital, some 10 minutes walk away. This is housed in a new building, which is so huge that I kept getting lost inside. Each floor looks like a maze inside, with many doors unlabelled. From the 9th floor, I had to go the 2nd floor, then back to 9th floor and finally 1st floor. Even finding my way out of the maze was mind boggling and I had to stop several times to ask the guards and doctors for directions back to the main lobby for me to order Grab.🤪 The only upside is my Fitbit buzzed and vibrated to inform me that I had hit 10,000 steps! Yay!
This is the Imaging Dept and there is no signal and no mobile network here, thus couldn’t do anything but people watch for more than an hour in freezing temp.
At the ward, I saw small kids undergoing dialysis and it’s really heartbreaking.
At the Registration Counter, I saw this little boy of about 5 years old hooked to a machine with tubes. It must be an oxygen tank or something.
At the Imaging Department, I saw a Malay man with 2 boys – one is about 12 and the other about 14 and both of them, though mentally normal, were on a wheelchair each. One of the boys has dwarfism and digestion issues and the other boy couldn’t walk and has a slightly enlarged head. And I thought how unfair can life be for this man as both his sons are wheelchair bound and sick but he looks like one very loving and patient dad.
Another Chinese lady walked out of the Imaging room with her maid carrying her daughter (about 8 years old) and this girl’s body is floppy and looked ‘twisted’. I could only guess that she has severe Cerebral Palsy and some other issues. At the lobby several Down Syndrome and cancer kids walked past me.
Like I’d mentioned before, whenever you feel like life’s unfair to you and you feel dissatisfied with your current life, just take half a day off and make a trip to HKL. You’ll instantly feel that your life ain’t that bad after all when you compare your life with what you’re bound to see at the hospital.
Cass and I now have a little over 2 months to prepare ourselves mentally for her procedure. Wish us luck. We really need loads of it.
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All the best to Cass for her procedure! May God watch over her and the procedure is completed with no discomfort and side effects!
Thanks Sarah!