I am conscious that every time we hear about the emergency services in hospitals in this country, that these reports are filled with stories of long delays, violence and overworked unfriendly staff.
I have only once before have had to go to the A & E in Waterford, that was in March in 1991 and, as I was in the process of having a brain haemorrhage at the time, I mercifully can remember none of it.
My wife Sile tells me that they treated me well and whisked me off to Cork University Hospital and ultimately complete recovery.

This morning just as I finished my leisurely breakfast (as a retired restaurateur I am now under very little pressure)I started to do a Sudoku.
Quite suddenly the numbers started to dance and spin before my eyes.
This feeling was similar to that moment when you stand up too suddenly and have a spell of out of focus vision and dizziness.
The only difference was that on this occasion the moment didn’t pass, I went to the door for some fresh air, no change, in fact my vision started to get worse.
I looked up at the clock and realised that I couldn’t read the spinning numbers.
At the same time the back of my head felt as if it was clamped with a band of steel, no pain but total tension.
My mind was suddenly flooded with feelings of awful recognition.
I was sure I was having another brain haemorrhage.
I struggled to the phone, now both dizzy and very scared, tried to look up the number of Sile’s school, the numbers kept spinning out of my vision.
Using every inch of control I could gather I settled on one number, then dialled that before settling on and dialling the others.
I got through and as luck would have Sile was on a break and by the phone and once I said, “I’m having some sort of attack , I can’t see properly” she just said “I’m on my way”
There followed an interminable 20 odd minutes while Sile drove home and I told myself that my chances of recovering from a second insult to the brain were not likely.
Mind you I was aware that there was some differences between this attack and the previous one.
Firstly even though I was feeling some pressure at the back of my head this was nothing like the intense pain I had experienced 15 years ago.
Secondly there had been nothing like this totally distorted vision the last time.

Eventually Sile got home, sure like myself that this was brain haemorrhage number two.
At that stage, to my relief my vision started to marginally improve.
As we were going out to the car to make our way to A & E, I glanced at the phone numbers list, even though my vision was still very blurred and out of focus I could now read the phone numbers with much less difficulty.
Then in the car out to the hospital I started to experience a circular tunnel of clarity in my vision, I discovered that if I looked directly forward I could see the car in front of us very clearly.
Thus was some hope born.
By the time we got to Emergency I was walking on my own even if I was leaning heavily on Sile for balance.

From the first moment I entered A & E I was treated with courtesy, patience gentleness and real concern.
As soon as we had told the checking in nurse something of my symptoms and history I was whisked on to a trolley, examined and questioned by first a nurse then, at much greater length, by a young doctor from Perth who was so considerate and gentle that I was quickly assured that I was in the best possible hands.

As all this was happening my dizziness was abating all the time.
The strange pressure band at the back of my head remained but the blurred images were now just an aura around my peripheral vision.

I began to feel that I was going to live.

My friendly Australian doctor then went off to consult a senior colleague and then said that because of my history they were going to give me a CAT scan to test for any bleeding in the brain.
I was then given a long examination and interrogation by a medical student from Trinidad, again I cannot emphasise strongly enough how polite she was, and how considerate of my comfort.
During all this time, possibly about an hour , I was constantly under observation, being hooked up all the usual ER type monitors but, and much more importantly, for a very nervous and frightened patient, there was someone physically with me at all times.
This was enormously reassuring.
At this stage Sile was allowed in to see me and we both began to realise that the prospect of my recovery was beginning to look like a possibility.
This feeling of relief that that gave me was enormous.
There was only one more serious hurdle to get over.
The CAT scan.
We both knew that if they found any traces of a bleed the chances of having an operation to repair the leak were much more likely.
We also both knew the long recovery process necessary after any operation on the brain.
The Cat scan experience was as comfortable as being strapped on to a trolley and the wheeled, prone, and into a machine could be expected to be, then we were back in A&E and waiting for the results.
We were brought into a private room for the meeting with a senior doctor in charge.
The first piece of information was that the CAT scan was clear.
Huge relief.
His diagnosis was even more surprising.
He examined in great detail my account of my vision problems.
He asked for exact descriptions of to the type of lack of focus, “ As the images were whirling were they still sharp?” “ How did the blurriness start to clear?”
When I told him about the moment in the car when my tunnel of clear vision began to expand he nodded in satisfaction.

His diagnosis was that I had not had a bleed in my brain, I had had all the symptoms of a migraine, my descriptions of my vision problems were casebook migraine symptoms.
That I had never before had an attack like this before was unusual but not unprecedented.
He explained that some attacks of migraine could even paralyse patients for their duration.
When I told him that I used to suffer from strong migraine type headaches from overindulgence in red wine until I had virtually given it up he reckoned that that clinched it.
(Important to remember at this stage that I had not consumed any drink since December )
I could go home.
At that stage my doctor from Perth took the time to see how I was getting on.
They then both stood there and beamed at Sile’s and my obvious joy that the whole ordeal was now over.

And that is it really.
I had a couple of paractemol when I came home which got rid of most of the end of the headache.
The phisycal symptoms were alleviated.
It may take a bit longer for us both to recover from the trauma.

It is shocking to realise how much doctor time I had been given , but very rewarding to know that never once did I receive anything but the very best of care and attention.
Thank you Waterford A&E