The NHS has been fantastic to me. They were fantastic from the very first moment, when I went into the clinic for the ECG and I was, it turned out I was having AF and they called the cardio person down. So that was huge caring years and years ago, and this summer, they have been fantastic. The NHS has been just awesome in the way that it’s looked after me because I was having, I had pains as well. You know, I had God knows what they’re from, I don’t think anybody has found out. They suggested it was indigestion last time, which is not true, because they happen randomly and at any time and, actually, they’re much less now. I seem to be sort of more stable again. So goodness knows what was going on, but so people were trying to find out what it was. So I had lots of tests on my heart to make sure it was working as well as it could. So I’ve had stress tests and echoes and I had an angiogram and all that kind of stuff. So really explored my heart. I must have the most well tested heart in, you know, the South of England. And I thought that was fantastic. At every stage, people are very caring, explain to you what’s happening and why they want to do the test and what the test involved. So the NHS could not have a happier more satisfied customer than I am, at the moment, and I think people should just realise the value of the NHS, what it is, you know, just amazing, amazing and free. Just amazing. So I’m a walking advert for the NHS at the moment.

Oh, he’s lovely. He really is. It’s always, Nice to see you again, [own name]. Now sit down. Now how have you been? Fine. Any problems? No. Good. And then he just says, We’ll have a little check. And then this time he said, Well, you haven’t done the treadmill for a couple of years or, and then I think you ought to do that. Okay. Which I did and he takes good care of me and if I feel, he always says, Now, don’t forget. If you’re worried about anything, you know where I am. So you can’t ask for better than that can you?

All the way through and from my doctor instantly and then in the [name of hospital], when I went to see the consultant there, had all the tests, everything was crystal clear and explained absolutely perfectly. I was really you know, really delighted with that because I knew just where I was and what the. What the outcomes would be.

Hes absolutely superb, this fella. He doesn’t talk down to you. He talks to you. He discusses everything in detail what he thinks will be best, asks you what you think, what, are you willing to go along with that? How do you feel about that? After you’ve had a consultation, he writes to you, and it’s surprising what he writes about because it’s in such detail, probably a page and a half and you think, how on earth did he remember to pick up those points because he wasn’t writing all the time? It’s a total discussion but, like I said to you, when he said to me about the warfarin, he thinks I should take it but, How do you feel? was what he said to me, Are you willing to go along with it? Hes not forcing me to take it but if you’ve got somebody who’s recommending it, who am I to go against his professional expertise? But no, he discusses everything in detail. He is a lovely person. Hes never trying to push you out. Always feel as though hes interested in in you as an individual and also as his patient. No, hes superb.

Anything to do with the heart is immensely troubling because it always feels as though it’s a matter of life and death because it is, in a way. I mean I can’t remember now which consultant it was but a consultant here in [city] once said to me that he had had a bout of AF and he now realised how utterly terrifying it can be and it had made him feel quite differently towards patients. Because I would imagine they see someone with a healthy heart comes in, it’s beating irregularly but there’s nothing else wrong with it, so what are you worried about? You’re fine. But once he had experienced this for himself, he could understand how terrifying it is and it is quite difficult to get that across to somebody who hasn’t had it.

Well, they, the consultant explained that he hed talked to colleagues and, you know, they he presented them with, you know, what he knew about me and what I’d told him, and what all the tests and everything else hed done, the scan results and all the rest of it. So they’d obviously looked at me with all the information to hand and decided that that was the best course of treatment for me. And that was something I felt, you know, very good about because they’d obviously, you know, looked at all the symptoms, all the results, the whole thing. They had the whole story and they decided that this was an appropriate medication to put me on. So that felt, I felt very good about that because you know, I was encouraged a) and b) I felt confident in taking that medication.

It was me that was pushing for them in a way and I would have said, you know, I wanted it because I so much wanted to be in sinus rhythm and I suppose they were going along with me as well, although the last time, after three episodes both the doctor had said to me and I said I’d thought about it as well and I thought I really don’t want to keep doing this.

Did they discuss it with you much in previous times and so on?

They would have done I, you know, and talked about long term and said to me that I probably will go into AF and I suppose again I was in denial and didn’t want to hear it and I really pushed for it not to happen. And, at the same time, was thinking, if you keep doing the same thing, If you if you keep doing what you’re doing, you’re going to keep getting what you get. And all that was in my head but there was still this drive in me to keep in sinus rhythm.

Look, one of the ambulance drivers, and my goodness what a terrific bunch of people they are, without fail, they are so calm and so nice, so helpful. And one of them said to me that, I said, Well, why does this happen when I’m, you know, I mean if I was doing exercise and the heart went into overdrive, you could perhaps understand it but always, it’s when I’m doing nothing really. And he said, Yes, well, we nobody knows that but because you’ve got this left bundle block, the heart, the wall, the blood goes, it should go A B C D and for some reason it goes A D E and goes the wrong way round, and then gets into a, you know, a confused state. And that’s, you know, the only way I can sort of visualise it.

I went back in the afternoon and he said, I have to tell you, you’ve got atrial fibrillation. And I’d no idea what that was, so he described it and he gave me, he also printed out about six pages of information about it, which I found very interesting, and he said, There are two ways we can treat it, either with aspirin or with warfarin. And he talked me all through that, and this was all on these information pages anyway. So I he said, Come back in a week. Read it all through and consider it. Talk it over with your sons if you want to, and then come back and let me know what you want to do. So I took it all home and he was very reassuring about it. You know, he didn’t make me frightened or anything and, in a way, I was quite glad to know because I’d been getting a bit breathless before that and I’d got very tired.