Thyroid Medication in Hospital Stay

[FancyPants54]

I am currently stuck in hospital due to a huge nosebleed on Tuesday morning. I came in with all my medicine for the week in my pill box. They insisted on locking it away in my nightstand. They have no idea what Armour is. I take Armour and some Levo at 8am and more Armour at 5pm and leave an hour before food. I have some meds for atrial fibrillation and vitamins that I take at 10am and 10pm.

They cannot get their heads around this. This morning I got access to my thyroid meds about 10 minutes before breakfast was thrust at me. And they have been on at me since 6:30 to take everything else. So frustrating.

Then 2 weeks ago I fell over hard and smacked my knees up and shoulder. One leg is badly bruised and swollen. They have forced it into a surgical stocking that is so tight I’m in pain all the time. The peripheral neuropathy in my feet is also aggravated by the tight stockings. I don’t know how anyone gets better from things in these places.

[helvella]

Wishing you well. Hope you get out as soon as possible.

[FancyPants54 in reply to helvella]

Me too. But I really hope they find something to cauterise first because it was a terrifying experience.

[helvella in reply to FancyPants54]

I struggle to imagine - I've only ever had minor nosebleeds. While it is easy to imagine the outside view - of blood - the experience of it happening to you must be very different - and deeply unpleasant.

[FancyPants54 in reply to helvella]

Deeply unpleasant. My husband suffers with them, and even he was getting worried enough to phone 999. Ambulance wait - 2 hours, whilst I was coughing out huge clots and pouring out of my nose.

We were told to drive ourselves to A&E! I had to take beach towels and a mixing bowl to bleed into and somehow get clothes on (hubby did that) and get meds together. All in all I was in the accident units of 2 hospitals well over 12 hours and finally got to a ward at 1:30 am. It’s been traumatic. I couldn’t wear a mask and the departments were full. Horrible all round. I’ve had inflated nasal balloons inside my nose all the way back since. Horrible. And they keep wondering why my BP is high. 4 weeks ago at my endo visit, it was perfect.

[Sparklingsunshine in reply to FancyPants54]

My mum used to suffer from horrendous nosebleeds, they made her anaemic. They found out she had a deviated septum in her nose. She had it cauterised several times but it didnt help.

[FancyPants54 in reply to Sparklingsunshine]

I’ve had some cauterising in the past for lesser bleeds so they have looked up there before. Hopefully I don’t have one of those as they didn’t say.

[bantam12]

While in hospital earlier this year I found it easier to just go with the flow for the duration of my stay and go back to normal tabs schedule once home, not ideal I know but trying to get the staff to change their rules is usually hopeless.

[FancyPants54 in reply to bantam12]

It is. Trouble is my own meds are locked away!

[bantam12 in reply to FancyPants54]

Yes they are locked up and it’s near impossible to get them unlocked any time other than drugs round especially now when staff are in short supply so nobody has time to help. Hopefully you will be out soon and can get back to your normal routine.

[Anthea55 in reply to bantam12]

I agree with bantam12 about going with the flow. A few days that are slightly different seems to be ok.

I was in hospital in January. As my thyroid meds are on private prescription they don't appear on my NHS record, so it took me several days to persuade them to give me levo at all. Luckily I take photos of my private prescriptions before posting them to be filled. They didn't understand that many of us need to stick with the same brand.

I was in hospital again recently. They commented that I might be on too high a dose of levo - due to my suppressed TSH. I explained that it was due to taking liothyronine as well as levo (they didn't seem to know about that). On my NHS record they only have the occasional TSH tests taken as part of annual blood tests - they don't see my spreadsheet of regular tests of TSH, free T4, free T3 etc as these are all private. I said that I would check it with my private thyroid doctor.

This time I was allowed to take my own supply and brands of levo and lio. I explained that it's not good to change brands; that helped.

Yes, go with the flow. After all we are in bed most of the time, not walking about as we would do at home, so not needing the same amount of energy.

Go home and revert to normal routines of thyroid meds and start taking supplements again - they really don't understand those!

[arTistapple]

As usual being too honest in our search for ‘help’ does not seem to help us. So many incidents to report, too many. Like you we have to be on our toes the whole time dealing with medics, right when we are at our most vulnerable. There is a huge barrier in communication with them. It really humongous. Who is really in charge or maybe, more accurately - what is in charge?

Hoping you get over this ASAP.

[Framboise]

I hope you can escape soon! The only advantage to the NHS not believing that I have a thyroid problem is that when I had to go into hospital a few years ago I didn't have to tell them about my NDT or hand it over. If you have any spare at home, you could perhaps ask someone to bring it in and simply take that rather than the ones locked away. Good luck!

[FancyPants54 in reply to Framboise]

I think they will discharge me this evening. The second nasal balloon is out and not bleeding. Need to wait about an hour and then have a look up there.

I have a hidden spare in my bag for 5pm.

[Jazzw in reply to FancyPants54]

Wishing you all the best for a happy escape 🤞

[FancyPants54]

Self sourced. My mistake was shoving it in the ziplock bag with everything else. But we left in a rush and were not particularly organised. I just put a few in a pill pot so I couldn’t loose the bottle. Then I got my husband to bring another couple in as a precaution.