Newslink April marketing special

Life as an ADI
A cautionary tale of the toll work can have, by Bryan Phillips
A pain in the chest – and you’re
glad you’ve got health insurance!
Sunday 19th May 2019: for me a typical
Sunday. Day off work, cleaning the car for the
week ahead and the standard personal trainer
session at the gym. However, this gym
session was to change my life forever!
I was doing some bench presses, which was
nothing unusual for me, with weights that
were comfortable for me to use. However, the
personal trainer kept telling me I was doing
things wrong and that my right arm was doing
all the work, and the left arm was being lazy.
After this gym session I returned home, and
soon the top of my left arm was agony. My
immediate thougt was I had pulled a muscle,
so I took the standard paracetamols and got
on with things.
Monday 20th May, I left for work. This day
was different as I had Pass Plus course
booked with a recently passed pupil. All is well,
but later that night I was in pain again with the
top of my left arm, cold sweats and I felt like
death. Again I took the standard paracetamols
and went to bed. However, the pain came and
went though the night and I can’t get to sleep.
Something was not right so I decide to go
to the hospital to get checked over. Off I drive
to Glasgow Royal Infirmary. The receptionist
takes my details and asks what my
symptoms are, then asks me to take a seat.
Abdominal
injections
for blood
thinners...
ouch!
Within seconds my name gets called and I
was taken into the casualty department and
put on to an ECG machine. I had a series of
needles into my arm and blood tests
conducted. Half an hour passes and I’m then
moved to another section of the hospital and
told the doctor is on their way to speak to me.
Mr Phillips, says the Doctor, it appears you
have had a myocardial infarction. Me being
from the east end of Glasgow and not being
the sharpest tool in the box says to the
doctor, ‘oh ok and what exactly is that’, and
the doctor replies, you are currently having a
heart attack.
My instant thought was, oh no, I have not
got time for a heart attack, I have a pile of
driving tests this week! I say to the doctor ‘oh
what happens next because I have got work
to go to tomorrow and driving tests to do’. The
doctor looked at me and said “Bryan you will
not be working for some time.”
Everything happened so fast it was a total
blur; I remember getting an injection of
Looking
groggy after
a little bout of
heart
surgery...
at least the
morphine
was good!
anti-sickness medicine and an injection of
morphine (that stuff was great) the pain went
away within seconds!
An echocardiogram scan was done and I
was put into an ambulance and transferred to
the Golden Jubilee Hospital in Glasgow for an
immediate operation. This is when it hit home
to me how serious things were. I felt
overwhelmed and embarrassed at the
ambulance sirens going and seeing all the
vehicles moving out the way to allow the
ambulance a path through the traffic.
Arriving at the Golden Jubilee Hospital I was
taken to the ward where the heart surgeon
came to see me prior to the operation. I had to
sign a consent form, so jokingly I said to the
surgeon “is this my death certificate I’m
signing”, to which he said if I didn’t sign it, then
it would be!
Form signed and I asked for a few moments
to speak with my dad before going to theatre.
It’s a conversation I’ll never forget, telling him
where all my important documents were in
42 NEWSLINK n APRIL 2024