So here I sit in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) in my hotel room just a day after arriving. This was meant to be a 4 night stay with day one being the consultation and planning, day two being the actual surgery, and day 3 and 4 being monitored recovery before flying back home.
As I said before they failed to mention in the massive amount of correspondence we have had up to this point that if your blood pressure is outside of a certain range, that you are ineligible for the surgery. I found that out after I had already flown 500 miles on a flight I did not want to be on at a time of day that I do not appreciate being awake.
Needless to say, it was a bit difficult for me to keep my cool during the consultation. However, I have learned from many years of living in South East Asia, that pulling a New Yorker and blowing your top and shouting at people, does not get you what you want here. It can actually accomplish quite the opposite.
I just love that all doctors have illegible handwriting so let me translate this for you.
My blood pressure on day two in one arm was 125/75... this is an acceptable range. However, when testing the other arm and I have no idea why that is necessary or what it accomplishes, my blood pressure was 140/75, which is not acceptable. The acceptable range is meant to be 120/80 to 135/80 or something like that... Honestly, I don't even know what any of these numbers mean and I should probably look that up.
it's my understanding that the reason why blood pressure is important during an operation that involves local anesthetic is because the application of the anesthetic is going to raise your blood pressure or it does to most people. This can result in a dangerous heart situation that although it is extremely rare, can result in death. The clinic is likely protecting themselves rather than me by having this policy because they can't have customers dying on the tables when they just wanted to have some hair moved from the back of their head to the front.
I didn't blow my top after hearing this information but had already discussed with the doctor that I had been in touch with them for months about this procedure, and made it EXTREMELY CLEAR that I do not live in this city and therefore would like to know what I need to do in order to prepare for the surgery. At no point in time was it ever mentioned to me that having high blood pressure would disqualify you for the surgery. At no point in time did we ever even talk about blood pressure at all.
They prescribed me some blood pressure pills - which were actually pretty difficult to find and ended up me employing the services of a delivery company in order to make it happen because i'll be damned if I am going to walk around in the streets in 100% humidity and 33 degrees C popping in to pharmacy after pharmacy where they don't speak the same language as I do.
The clinic also said they would pay for me to stay in Saigon longer, as in they would pay for my flight replacement and additional days for me to stay in the hotel. This was nice of them to offer but I am one of those guys that has a rather extreme attachment to his dog and I do not want to be away from her for any longer than I must. It broke my heart and hers when I dropped her off at my friends' house where they have two, much larger dogs than her. I could see in her eyes that she knew I was about to abandon her and I hate it when that happens. Thankfully the dogs calmed down after I left and the couple who is looking after her sent me a picture of her chilling out on the sofa.
Back to the clinic. They recognized that it was a terrible error on their part to not inform me of the blood pressure requirement beforehand and told me that once my blood pressure can return to normal levels that they will pay for my flight back to the city as well as my hotel for 3 nights during the procedure. This shows me that they actually do give a crap what their customers think of them but also to be fair , the price of both of those things (the flight and the hotel) is relatively meaningless compared to how much the transplant procedure is going to cost - which is going to end up being around $5000 by the time it is all said and done.
They also threw in a free 1-hour hair spa treatment, which isn't really my sort of thing at all but I didn't really have anything else to do today so I went for it. During this treatment they did all sorts of stuff that I consider to be "mumbo jumbo" such as putting my head under an herbal spa, having some sort of electric comb with red lights emitting from it, and also putting me under a UV "Space Helmet" for 30 minutes.
I can't really imagine that any of these things encourage hair strengthening, but that is what they claim. I think it all sounds like horse-feathers. I did appreciate that the chairs, although in good shape, were so old that they had ash trays attached to the arm-rests.
I actually am old enough to remember a time when you could just smoke anywhere you wanted and this was a bit down memory lane for me. But you shouldn't smoke. I think everyone knows that now.
So where we stand now is that I am flying back to Da Nang today, 4 days earlier than I had previously thought I was going to. The clinic has told me that once my blood pressure drops to an acceptable level and can be verified by a clinic that they will pay for my return airfare as well as the hotel that I will be staying in during the treatment. So now the only issues is how long is that going to take?
This was meant to be a life-changing week for me, one that took a bit of courage and a bunch of money as well. But instead I just ended up on 2 flights that I didn't want to be on and staying in a rather average hotel eating delivery food that was also rather sub-standard.
The good news is I will be back with my dog within 5 hours and in my own bed tonight and that makes me happy. Now we just have to get to work on this blood pressure stuff!
