Champion?

Came across an interesting advert in a magazine this weekend. An medical research programme, looking at brain based things, is searching for 'Research Champions' to get involved with their work. They want to come, interview you, find out all they can and then hopefully give you the chance to pass on your information and experiences to others.

Given my brain is, in a word, interesting, I will hopefully be a good candidate to get involved. I have a sneaky feeling there is some interesting information nestled away inside of it that will hopefully be of use to people.

We shall see what happens, but this 'feels' like a good thing to be doing, so here's hoping it all happens for the good. Who knows, I might even get a research paper written about me? That would be very special indeed!

Yes, I'm weird, I know.

Vaccination

I has had me the anti-swine flu vaccination thing. The media seems hell bent on whipping up an epic storm over it all, but by and large, it was a fairly mundane process.

Yes, the doctors surgery was filled with legions of feral children who ran rampant through the halls whilst their disinterested parents sat texting people on their cellphones.

Yes, the appointment was late.

And yes, it was all made up for by a very cute nurse sticking a needle into my arm.

What can I say? I quite like injections into the muscles. It's like scratching somewhere you can never reach.

Any side effects you ask? Well, nothing really, although it does feel like someone has stuck a needle into my arm (cute nurse, I'm looking at you...and smiling). Funny that, don't you think?

Everyone I know of who has had it has complained of a sore arm afterwards, and one person had a very sore one. For me it really just feels like a bruise - a little uncomfortable if you rub it, or lie on it, but otherwise, ok.

What did make me laugh with it all was as you trotted out, rolling down your sleeve, they handed you a little leaflet, tucked inside of which was a vaccination card saying what you'd had, when you'd had it and which arm you'd had it in. The nice touch with it was the phone number that said 'Please call if you have an reactions!'

I really don't think anyone will be calling that number as if you sift out the press sensationalism, this thing is quite safe. And besides, for someone like me, which would you rather? A sore arm, or a life threatening illness?

Here's hoping you too get a cute nurse as part of the deal.

Want

Listening to a lot of music lately. It's helping sift through the soup of medicines research I'm currently on.

I'm learning interesting stuff though. Did you know, for instance, that one shot of the Rebif costs £57.32. That makes the bag I received today worth a little under £4,000!

It also lists some interesting side effects too. I quote:

"...blood disorders, menstrual disorders, mood and personality changes, suicide attempts, confusion and convulsions..."

Don't recall anyone mentioning that to me when I signed up, strangely enough.

Still, I want to get some answers on medicines, but that'll have to wait a little while yet.

Meantime, is it ok if I want these guys' jobs?

Ending in '...ine'

Bit quiet from me as I'm off researching new medicines that I will most likely be starting around Christmas.

They have long, confusing names, all of which end in '...ine' and all of which have a crap load of side effects, none of which sound particularly fun.

V(ictory)

I sometimes wonder if I should have been a doctor?

Happy 5th everyone! Go blow something up to celebrate history!

D(octor)-Day

Eight months of faffing leads me to going to see a doctor at 8pm tomorrow evening, three years to the day since I landed up in a hospital bed. Funny that, ain't it?

Still, I think it will be a good visit and hopefully 'stuffs' will get sorted, or at least start being sorted - I'm under no delusions as to the speed at which these things progress.

But still, it's a start. I'll let you know how it goes.

Quiz Time

So without giving too much away, I just got invited to participate in another one of those MS drug survey things. Pretty apparent for anyone who has followed developments in the treatments for MS, it was relating to the new stuff in the pipeline, such as the oral treatments for the disease.

I won't give away too much in case anyone gets the chance to do it, but if you do, then please give it a go! The more info they get on these things, the better they'll understand what we're after in a treatment.

You'll have to forgive me for sneaking out one little comment though. One of the options asked about which of the following side effects you'd be more likely to favour in a drug. The choices were 'a chance of hair loss' or 'a chance of a fatal brain infection'.

Hmm... let me think about that one.