Monday, February 28, 2011

Rehabilition

28 February 2011

The last day of the month. Today I went to Braeside hospital to do so,e rehabilitation. The appointment was at 12.30 I had to leave for it at about 12pm so I didn't eat lunch nor was I hungry since I had some breakfast before my medicines. I have chosen not to take the anti depressant meds as I had gone swimming but because of the minor scratch or patch on my leg it stings when I get water on it. I will have to take them tonight.

I arrived at the day hospital and directed to the waiting area where I met the organising doctor or the co coordinator for the day. We then went to another room where she asked some preliminary questions to better understand the situation.We then went back to the waiting area for the first doctor who would be the speech therapist. She came and got the medical records and me of course and we walked to another room.

The speech therapist was really nice actually they all were. Firstly some initial check up showed her that I had trouble pronouncing some words. She explained why I shouldn't have hard foods like peanuts and the like and suggested I avoid those foods as it could be dangerous for me if I were to choke on some foods and food ended up in my lungs. The other thing she said was that I should put less in my mouth when I eat and drink a lot slower to avoid any problems wjith the choking. After this we were back to the waiting area for the next doctor the physiotherapist. She came in and we were off to the centre's gym.

The physiotherapist brought us to the gym at the centre where It had lots of the equipment that the place had and the room was quiet spacious. The initial inspection was some exercises to determine the degree of my lack of co ordination. The “test” had a total of 56 points and through all the exercises I managed a score of 40. We had originally been in one area of the gym but we moved to the walking bars to do some of the test as it was dangerous if I had to do them where we were. Then she went to get the walking aides. There were two things that I wanted to try, crutches and a walking frame. I didn't like the walking stick as it often just gave me support on one side and I would need help on the other side. The crutches seemed to be a problem as I would mistime my legs and it as well as the want to move quicker. Then I tried the walking frame, it seemed to offer me the right mix of support and it gave me freedom to move at my speed so it was the perfect thing. Next the occupational therapist came in because we were running a bit late and got us for the other room where she worked.

The occupational therapist was in charge of the daily activities and handled a lot of the daily tasks that I had to do. She wanted to see how I got into bed and out of it, showering, toilet, brushing etc. We then went back to the gym where she asked me to demonstrate how I would go up and down the stairs as there was a staircase in the corner of the gym. The next step was going to another area of the gym and she explained some things I should do around the house rather than just give me some exercises that I had to do. There were two things that I will do and I have done one of them already:
  1. dishes after dinner or even go for a walk
  2. making/getting my own breakfast
yes these are things that I should do on my own anyway but my parents were too nice to me in the past and as I was growing up.

Anyway tomorrow I have to go to centrelink in the morning as I am ineligible for a study allowance anymore and I have to go in person for an assessment to see if I can get some sort of medical pension or something. I wanted to type more about today but I didn't want the blog entry to be really long so I kept it to mainly just the rehab I did today from 12.30pm-3.30pm. Another thing is they let me borrow the walking frame and encouraged to use it, i would return it at the next appointment.

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