Taking mum to the GP

The nurse when she saw me this morning at the nursing home told me mum had had a bleed from her ear this morning. I went in to see her and not long after I asked how her ear was. She put her finger in and it came out covered in dark blood. I popped down the hallway to see the nurse and she told me she would phone the GP. About 15 minutes later she appeared in mum's room and told me she had made an appointment for mum and I to see the doctor at 3pm.

It was about 11am at this point and I immediately went downstairs to the main desk to ask about getting lunch in the dining room organised for me, and they told me it would be OK. I went back upstairs and then mum got ready to go to the park because it was a nice day for a walk. We had to go around the building works when we got to the street outside because they are still laying rubber pipes for stormwater drainage. We made it to the second bench and sat down for about 20 minutes, then headed back inside for lunch.

It had been a long time since I had had lunch at the nursing home. The troubles with H had meant I had kept away from this particular activity entirely for some months. On the menu was beef with chips and boiled veges, and gravy. Mum had fried and battered fish with chips and veges. We sat with two other residents and had a quiet lunch. When it was finished we headed back to mum's room to wait for the hour to depart for the GP's. We watched the news on TV. I gave myself plenty of time to get to the GP's because it was a location I had never been to before and because of unknown traffic conditions and the work going on outside the nursing home.

It took a bit of fiddling to get onto the main street because of the roadworks ongoing due to the stormwater drainage job, but we were soon at the GP's surgery with 15 minutes to spare. I was glad we had left early and we sat in the waiting room watching a drama on Channel Nine on TV.

The GP arrived back soon after and before long we were in his room. He had some implements ready, including a large syringe and a basin of warm water. He placed a kidney basin under mum's ear and injected several syringe-fuls of warm water into it for a period of about five minutes until the passage was clear and he could see what was happening inside. He said that the bleeding was from the ear drum and suspected an infection, so prescribed some antibiotics. We left soon afterwards and got back to the nursing home, where I relayed the GP's messages to the registered nurses on duty. I also gave them the prescription.

It was a long day and to cap it off there was a major accident on the M2 near Lane Cove Road, which held traffic up for about 10 minutes. After clearing that barrier it was fairly clear through to the Western Distributor, and home.