Kate Evans
Kate's Cycle The UK in 28 Days
Fundraising for Thrombosis UK
Story
“You’re too young for a blood clot” – I have learnt that nobody it TOO young, and pulmonary embolisms can happen to anyone.. any age, race, gender, and with all levels of health and physical fitness. The majority of the time these PE’s are classed as “provoked”, meaning there is a reason behind its formation and an explanation why, however on the rare occasion (like myself) they are “unprovoked” meaning no formation reason, which can be hard for anybody, as it was me, to digest. This is why I am now completing this “Cycle The UK” challenge to not only raise funds for a charity that now, and forever will be close to my heart, but also to raise more awareness for a diagnosis that too many people, including once myself do not have enough knowledge on.
I never thought at 29 I would have a pulmonary embolism (a.k.a blood clot in my lung). On the last weekend in February I had a hard time breathing deeply, with a painful stitch-like feeling in my chest, back and neck along the left hand side. The morning of the 1st March I visited my GP with my wonderful Mam in hope that a simple assessment and maybe medication would resolve the issue. However that was not the case as at this point I was experiencing severe shooting chest pains after every breath. I was, on GPs request, admitted to hospital as an emergency where I was urgently seen by a doctor, given medication to temporarily ease the pain while they conducted an ECG (an Electrocardiogram test used to detect underlying heart conditions), took blood samples & sent me for an emergency chest x-ray to establish if at worst case I had a PE. Following receiving clear results on both bloods and ECG outcome, the x-ray showed slightly different and the doctor had a growing concern for an area of my lung detecting a possible issue. On assessment they allowed me to be discharged overnight as an outpatient after injecting anticoagulant into my stomach and talking me through how to inject myself in the early hours to prevent any further
damage before I am admitted back to hospital for an emergency CT and ultrasound scan the following morning. Following the CT scan the results, it unexpectedly showed a larger than expected clot blocking multiple veins, that if was left any longer could have shockingly been life threatening. I
was extremely lucky that day. They are not sure why a young, healthy female developed a PE, and I have a follow up planned with a haematologist to run more tests to hopefully get to the bottom of it, along with a heart echo scan to check for any heart damage as a result. For now, I am slowly but surely on the way up, feeling better, and am on pain meds and blood thinners and am looking forward to a hopefully healthy future ahead.
Not forgetting a HUGE THANK YOU to our amazing NHS service for the VIP treatment, you blew me away!