I'm New... Is there anyone out there in the same position as me?

[Lotus-Blossom]

My Embolisation has been put on hold because of the Coronavirus. Which angers me because I have the fast growing kind as they were sticking out of my abdomen. So for now I am on an injection that will shrink the fibroids or slow down the growth, possibly both. But I can only be on it for 3 months. I know they will grow again when the injection is out of my system (body). I'm scared based on what happened to me before as I ended up in the I.C.U because of them. I just pray get the Embolisation soon.

Is there anyone out their in the same position as me?

[Alaine1 Administrator]

Unfortunately virtually every patient has had their treatments affected including outpatient treatments for all but a few conditions. Even then many patients with the same condition but at another NHS trust will have had their treatment or surgery cancelled. This has also been the case across many other countries healthcare systems. This includes cancer patients for which surgeries and or chemotherapy is absolutely urgent as a delay even by a few months can change the picture from curable to terminal. My treatments have been affected and virtually all of my outpatient consultations not just for pelvic pain but other illnesses were cancelled- I’m still waiting for new appointments for 3 of them. I’d say everyone on here has faced the same hurdles with appts and surgeries cancelled but unfortunately it was something that had to be done not only to save lives but to also stop more people becoming unwell coming into hospital for appts or surgeries that could safely be rescheduled. If your surgery was urgent you would have been prioritised when surgeries were restarted. The number one priority across every dept was for cancer surgeries and then every consultant was asked to prioritise how urgent every other patient was so those who condition was dangerous eg endometriosis compromising kidney function which can result in loss of a kidney is prioritised over fibroids or endometriosis not involving the kidney. Again it’s not your consultant not believing your symptoms but it’s likely you were unlucky previously rather than it being something that will happen again.

But if we’re want to keep routine surgeries going it’s important that we do everything we can to prevent the spread and avoid people going into COVID wards or ICU by sticking to social distancing or not having people stay around our homes etc. This is important to also allow those patients who are still deemed extremely clinically vulnerable to safely attend their hospital appts, go out for exercise etc as these patients have been assessed as likely to die if they catch the virus. This is the situation I’ve been in since the start of the pandemic and to be honest it’s been very frightening and I know that consultants have continued to worry about this group as the country has opened up again. Hopefully by the end of January you will have heard something from the hospital but as I’m sure you can imagine there is a big backlog of patients to get through. I hope this helps