I woke at about 3 a.m. with the most intense stabbing pain in the right-hand side of my chest, towards the back. I assumed that I had slept funny and that I had simply trapped a nerve or something. The pain was unbelievable, though. I took acetaminophen but it did nothing.
At 8 a.m., the phones for my doctor’s surgery opened and I rang to see if one of the doctors could do anything to deaden the pain. It was December and I had arranged a team lunch at a pub near the office with about 12 people turning up. I was looking forward to it as we hadn’t got together much since lockdown.
About 11 a.m. I got a phone call back and I described my symptoms to the doctor. I expected her to dismiss them, but she told me she would like to see me immediately.
So, I jumped in the car and headed there, thinking that I could go from there to the pub. She saw me straight away and we went through the symptoms again. She told me she thought I had a pulmonary embolism and that I needed to go straight to the ambulatory care unit at the local hospital.
I asked if I could go after lunch and she said no, I had to go straight there. After several tests, they injected me with heparin and told me I needed to come back the next day for a scan.
When the results came in, I was called in to see the doctor. He said that he was prepared to bet I didn’t have clots in my lungs, but the scans had shown that I did. He put me on apixaban immediately, and I will be on it for the rest of my days.
I have read a lot of other people’s experiences, which has really brought home the fact that a PE really can be life-changing. It all happened so fast, and it was only after I had the diagnosis that it hit me that the outcome could have been so different.
I get tired a lot more easily now and I am frightened of long distance travel. I recently had the chance to go to Hong Kong for work but I declined due to the fear of clots developing.
I am so grateful to the GP I saw who reacted so quickly and the excellent National Health Service (the publicly funded healthcare system in England) team who worked to get to the diagnosis.
Resources
Living Your Best Life on Blood Thinners
Signs and Symptoms
Know Your Risk
