Elevated Liver Enzyme

I was a bundle of nerves on the Monday preceding my appointment with the Gastro-Enterology Clinic. The hour seemed to crawl ever so slowly and as it crept nearer, my anxiety grew. By the time Thursday came, butterflies were virtually fluttering ferociously inside my tummy. My heart was palpitating and I could have sworn my blood pressure shot up by a notch or two.

The clinic was packed. I managed to find a vacant seat whereupon I whipped out my tablet and commenced this nasty business of gaming. Only, it did not avert my restlessness. My heart wasn't in the game. There was a good mix of patients waiting for their number to be called. Most received free treatment so they had to be civil servants, some looking as distinguished as you please. The old man on my left was looking with some interest at a young girl standing on his left. Following his eyes, mine stopped when I found the object of his interest. It was the young girl's pair of very short shorts. No sense of propriety, I muttered to myself as I pooh-poohed at the inappropriateness of it all. (*grins* ~~~ I sounded like an old dowager chaperoning a debutante to her first social presentation, don't I?)  Somewhere behind me, an old lady suddenly burst out in lamentation. "Why are the doctors not back yet?", she moaned. Nobody saw fit to answer her.

Two young ladies stood at a corner with the nurse from reception. They were well dressed and well heeled, one could see. One of them lowered her voice in a whisper. The nurse listened, smiled and said "I'm afraid I cannot do that. There are a lot of patients today."

It was about an hour before my number was finally called. I went in to see the young doctor. She was pleasantly attentive and listened carefully while I explained the nature of my complaint. I showed her my tabulated enzyme statistics which showed the fluctuation over a stipulated period, the actions taken and the consequences thereof. She took my chart to her mentor as they discussed my case. Both were impressed with my record keeping which pleased me immensely for I had taken trouble to track same in order to ease the four doctors attending to me.

Eventually, Dr Lim advised me not to be unduly anxious over my condition. The liver enzymes are in the thousands when the fatality factor kicked in. More blood tests were required before they could ascertain the cause of my elevated enzyme. They have to first rule out the possibility that antibodies were attacking my liver. (Now, why would my antibodies want to do something like that?)  If that proved negative, a liver biopsy will be the next course of action.