« A diary of hospital life following a diagnosis of acute kidney failure »

Graphs and charts for blood pressure, potassium and creatinine

These charts are only really interest to renal students Click to enlarge

Blood pressure was very high until the Royale put me on amlodopine and got to treating the underlying cause of the kidney failure.
As can be seen, the evening blood pressure was dangerously high early on and indeed, with other problems, causes such a literally blinding headache that I was vomiting to the point I was coughing up blood from torn muscles in my throat.
Creatinine is more a marker in the blood than anything else. 'Popping a catheter in' in early September relieved some of the back pressure alleviating some of the symptoms, but not the underlying causes. Bilateral insertion of stents to the ureters did the trick though, as can be seen by the rapid drop. Months on things still aren't right (and may be deteriating again) as the damage had already been done, but at least I'm off the danger list.
Note to doctors: I'll just pop a catheter in. There is no 'just', and it's not so much 'pop' as insert it into a delicate area and wait for the screams. Trust me on this, it HURTS - the lubricatant and numbing gel just lures the victim patient into a false sense of security! Strangely enough, I was more terrified of having it removed that put in. Go figure!
People have individual tolerances, obviously so it's just a rule of thumb, but being casually told by a nurse that Oh, that's high translates as any higher and you are dead does not inspire a great deal of confidence in a hospital trust. Way to go Whiston - NOT!
While I was in the Royale one old git (and he was!) came in with a Potassium of 8.5 and left long before me, another came in with a Potassium of 6.2 and died a few hours later of a major heart attack. Really!
Mostly mine remained stable but no-one at Whiston ever mentioned the importance of diet. I was allowed unlimited fruit juice, vegetable with meals, pints of milk and bananas served with meals.
Again, something people have different levels of tolerance with. My friend Peter was perfectly fine at levels around 25, but anything over 15 and I was heaving. I needed to keep eating sandwiches etc to settle my stomach. It was not a fun time for me, especially given I'd never really had an upset stomach in my life before all this.

As an aside, stress levels!

Just before I went into hospital I did a stress test online with the NHS's 'Oh What a Relief' site. While overall it was moderate, touching high on the check itself I scored 161 on the stress indicator, where 25 is considerated moderate and 49 is considered very high. Clearly there are issue to sort!