Well it was a funny old kind
of week last week. There were sober parts – we celebrated the 75th
anniversary of D-Day. I listened to the early morning live reports from Gold
Beach in Normandy and the inauguration of the new statue and memorial to all
those from the UK who lost their lives in order that we (and possibly the rest
of the world) can enjoy the freedoms we have today. The US president was in
attendance, as was the French president. Theresa May gave a speech in what was one
of her last public duties before stepping down as Leader of the Conservative Party
and in July, as the UK Prime Minister.
Dr John (the Night Tripper) died,
and for those old enough to remember his music, here is something that will
stay in your mind all day if you dare to sing it – “Kon kon, killy kon kon - Walk on gilded splinters.” There were lighter moments, another
Doctor - Dr Darren Naish, an academic who has spent the last 20 years studying
legends - admitted last week at the Cheltenham Science Festival that the Yeti
and the Loch Ness Monster don’t exist. He claimed that in an age of high-quality
mobile phone cameras, if they did exist, they would have been snapped by now. And
last Thursday, I discovered through the power of Twitter (thanks @JennyTheM),
that Sainsbury’s (there are other supermarkets) now sell Marmite Peanut Butter;
a real treat for your breakfast toast.
Last Wednesday as I was felling a
tree, I got knocked clean off a ladder by a branch that slipped out of my grip
and crashed into my ankle knocking me to the floor. Thankfully, I was only
about 12 feet from the ground and was using a bow saw and not my chain saw at
the time. The resulting haematoma was very dramatic, but as I could still
wriggle my toes, I reckoned nothing was broken. And apart from some bruising, it
looks as if I got away with it.
I mention this, as last week was
also the first ever Legs Matter Week. Up until quite recently I have never
really thought about my legs. It was only when I injured my leg and the open
wound wouldn’t heal that I began to realise what a difference to my life having
healthy legs meant. Thankfully after a course of antibiotics and many, many weeks of
rest, my leg is more or less healed. The wound area is still sensitive and despite
now being very careful, when I knocked it the other week, it led to more blood
loss and another infection.
Reading the information published
as part of awareness raising for Legs Matter Week, I discovered that the UK
spends nearly £5.3bn each year managing lower limb ulceration and associated
co-morbidities. Nearly £2bn is spent treating leg ulcers alone. Not only that,
but NHS England has highlighted that the care provided to people can often be
sub-optimal with much variation in the costs of treatment and healing times. In
fact, as I discovered for myself, non-healing of leg ulcers and other wounds is
quite common. Some 41% of patients have leg ulcers that fail to heal within 12 months
of onset. As I also found out for myself, this can be very painful and can have
a detrimental impact on a person’s physical and psychological well-being.
What I didn’t know was that lower
leg ulceration and non-healing wounds affects about 1.5% of the UK population.
Some 750,000 people each year live with such wounds. The commonest age for people
to start to have such problems appears to be between 60-80 years of age. Given
that in the UK we have a growing ageing population, this is not good news for
folk like me or others in this age bracket. Additionally, 70% of leg ulceration
is a result of venous disease. Varicose veins can be a sign of a developing venous
disease, and varicose veins are a pretty good predicative factor in developing leg
ulceration.
Now I’ve had varicose veins from
as far back as I can remember. Indeed, I was treated for these at a very young
age by sclerotherapy. A form of this treatment has been around since 1930 and
is still used today, although these days it’s a great deal more sophisticated than
that used on me. Strangely, I only have one leg affected. So the Leg Matters
Week was an important wake up call for me. I now absolutely understand the need
to take care of my skin and what the possible consequences of not doing so
might be.
And delightfully, my colleague
@StephensMelanie, from the University of Salford last week successfully completed
her PhD journey. Melanie has worked tirelessly to promote tissue viability and
wound care. She created some of the most realistic ‘wounds’ I have ever seen to
help our student nurses understand how they might be best looked after. I once
had the privilege of opening one of her very successful wound care conferences.
Having a mental health background, I took the opportunity to remind the conference
delegates of the importance of also considering how we might best care for those
wounds we can’t see. Drawing on the art work of Frida Khalo, I explored the
notion of Carl Jung’s wounded healer and Isabel Menzies Lyth work around why
some of us might be ‘compelled’ to enter the caring professions. They didn’t
invite me back for subsequent conferences.
As Dr John might have said: Kon kon, killy kon kon – I walk on gilded splinters.
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