So begins the....waiting!!

So today was my consult with the new Radiotherapist/Oncologist at the Dr Verbeeten Institute in Tilburg . I suppose by British terminology you would call it a private clinic, seems to specialise in cancer and cancer treatment nice and posh.

I had no idea how long it would take to get there, so I decided to get a taxi from the station and off we went, 12 mins later I arrived 35 minutes early..oh well..I'll know next time.

Nothing much to report aside from a ridiculous Charlie Chaplin moment on my part.

On checking in they give you a token for the coffee machine, ok it was early so off I went to get my coffee. Token in...press for coffee/melk/suiker and voila...

Brown and white steams start gushing out of the spouts. Arrghh...no plastic cups, I rushed to grab a cup from the sideboard next to the machine, but too late, the precious fluid had stopped flowing..

I walked back to the fancy glass reception desk to ask for a new token, gesticulating fairly mildly I thought, pointing back to the machine. Not realising that the cup I still held in my hand was in fact a used cup, still containing a small amount of coffee from its previous use...

This small amount, now became propelled through the air, watched by me with sinking heart as it headed straight for the young blonde receptionist behind her desk and her extremely white blouse........fortunately for her at least, the momentum of the coffee was more of a slow arc than a straight bullet projection and it didn't clear the desk, but it did splash all the way down before leaving a nice splash on the carpet.

I apologised profusely as she handed me a new token and explained my actions, which she had missed as she was picking up a new token.

New token in place I took more careful note of the instructions in Dutch which I now realised said first put your cup under the spout...and I found clean cups.

So I sat and waited and watched mildly amused as 1st the receptionist, then a cleaner, then the cleaners supervisor, then the supervisors supervisor, all tried to remove the stain of coffee that could be seen had slipped in between the glass plates and the mounting bolts.....I must admit, even though I was the cause (and it was a total accident) I took some pride in knowing I was keeping these 3 fine people in work.


Anyway...it was pretty much the same deal as Utrecht, consultant went through the notes, discussed the process, he's going to do 35 fractions, 23 on my neck and 12 on my tumour site, or something. He needs to work it out before the 1st treatment. Interestingly, he does not believe there will be any long term side effects for this. We'll see I suppose. I mentioned my probably infection/pain in my mouth which he's a bit worried about and was going to give me some AB's but decided instead to contact Drs van Gemart who wants me to go into Breda hospital tomorrow to check it over.

Also he will arrange for a dental hygienist to get my teeth all nice and clean again...Actually there's a serious point to that, if they are not in good nick, the radiation can have nasty effects on teeth, so a full clean and polish. hopefully after they sort out the current opening problems.


Next is an appointment to have my mask fitted and a precision CT scan to work out the correct placement. Took them qute some time to sort those appointments though, ah well, wouldn't be a clinic if there wasn't a wait.

Took a bus back, only took 8 minutes including stops...think the taxi took the long way round.