Had my 70th birthday on the 4th. Was in two minds about it as I hate the thought of getting old - don't feel it! Anyway, I was going to ignore it but my eldest son rang to say that he and his wife would take us both out to a celebratory dinner - me to pick and book the restaurant. I chose Biviano's at Top Ryde - I had been there before and had enjoyed the food.

My youngest son and partner came along too, which was great. Unfortunately my daughter couldn't come as they had just returned from Brisbane late that afternoon and were exhausted from the long drive.  Also they didn't have a babysitter and the boys were also tired and cranky - not the best time to try to make them behave in a restaurant!

We had a lovely Italian dinner and I received some excellent presents. Andy gave me a Pandora bracelet, Michelle gave me two tops and two bottles of wine, Chris & Vickey gave me 2 Gold Class tickets to the cinema. Mel came over later in the week and gave me 3 beads for my Pandora bracelet and 2 tickets to a Beatles show at Star City.

All in all, it was a most enjoyable day !

My father passed away over the weekend after being diagnosed with cancer 6 months ago, a disease that spread rapidly and had affected many of his major organs by December 09

I'm publishing this, not to be morbid, but so that if you go through something similar to me, you are informed.  We had a wonderful nurse in the PA hospital who let us know about the different stages that dad was going through as his body shut down.  I've found some good links that offer more information, I just wish I'd read them before dad passed away.  Sadly we just knew he was really sick, but did not realise how close to death he was.

• Amitahba Hospice, Signs of Dying
• About.com: The Dying Process
• What to Expect
• Care for the dying.

I'm also going to depart from my usual state of being a Christian fangirl, and say that many Buddhist hospices have excellent information.  If my memory serves me correctly from when a family friend passed away, Buddhists have a focus on palliative care and supporting families with terminally ill loved ones as they believe that the process of going from this world to the next is important.  As such, it is not good to have an untimely death or put a person at risk of suicide.  The first link in particular is quite good, and after seeing my father die, I do share the idea that the dying  process is the process of gradually going from this life to the next.

Last night I caught the train into town with a friend to watch the fireworks. We had to walk from Wynyard as the trains didn't run to Circular Quay that night. There were extremely large numbers of people, family groups as well as lots of young people, all heading in the same direction.

When we arrived at Circular Quay about 11pm, we found that many areas had been barricaded off and only those who had arrived prior to 6pm were able to get close enough to have a good view. There were lots of security guards at each possible entry way to stop people sneaking in. One of the guards told us that he could let people out but not in, even if there wasn't anyone in there, which seemed rather stupid to us.

We finally found a position where we could see most of the bridge but not the pylons, while peering over the heads of those in front of us. It was quite an interesting sight but I personally didn't think it was worth all the money that was spent. I would rather the money was spent on our run-down hospitals.

We had a great cup of coffee afterwards from one of the vans parked near the Quay before heading back to Wynyard - one of the best I've ever had! I was prepared for a crappy cuppa but was pleasantly surprised. The crowds, both coming and going, were all good-humoured and I didn't see any bad behaviour.

 In fact, the only thing that left a bad taste in my mouth was when we were buying our tickets at the railway station - we were forced to use the ticket machine as no one was on duty at the ticket office - we noticed that the young people in front of us in the queue ALL bought a single child's ticket! Says a lot for their honesty! If the Rail Authorities had paid someone double wages for the night, they would have easily recouped the extra money and made a big profit!  And of course there weren't any ticket inspectors on the trains coming home or at the ticket barrier at the station. A lost opportunity to make the railways earn some much needed cash!

I’ve heard it said in political circles that women my age and older care fairly passionately about the health system, as we are finally exposed to it, having not normally needed to access hospitals much during our late teens and twenties.  How true this is.  And I am saying this, not because I have children, which is more common, but because my family has had something of an annus horibus with respect to health.  I’ve torn my calf muscle, my grandfather is finally too frail to look after himself and another close family member was diagnosed with a terminal illness.  I have to say overall that despite the bad press and the horror stories from both the press and my personal circle, we seem to have a good system here in Queensland, but there is much need for improvement.  When you’re dealing with sick people and their families, you really can not do enough for their comfort and information.

My first big gripe is actually our private health care system.  Private hospital costs are fairly well covered by private health care and Medicare still covers much of it.  But private health insurers really are selling us short by not covering doctors fees at all or the fee to be admitted to Emergency in a private hospital.  I was several hundreds of dollars out of pocket last year when I had surgery – my doctor charging almost twice the Medicare fee and only 75% of anaesthetic costs ever covered between Medicare and private health.  My terminally ill relative also decided to take a chance on going private with treatment for a bit this year after getting a wee bit fed up with the public hospital, and is still paying off the charges – pretty rich for someone who is on 75% of their income.

Coordination of treatment seems to go by the wayside when someone is being treated by a team rather than just one doctor as has been the case with both my relatives, and this was also the experience of a close friend of mine who had a parent pass away from cancer this year.  I have spent hours and hours frustrated and on the verge of tears trying to find out what was happening with my relative’s treatments and then trying to co-ordinate with more than one hospital is enough to make me want to take up Voodoo and curse the lot of them.  However I have discovered just recently that once someone gets into palliative care for their pain, that the communication between practitioners does get a little better.

And on a more practical note, hospital parking is a b!tch.  The last thing you want to do when you are visiting a sick or dying relative, or having someone visit you is to be hit for $12-$15 parking!  I can wear it as I work and I think my relatives are worth it, but I can imagine most people who have to be treated in the public hospital system may find it a stretch if they are visiting frequently.  And the thing is when someone is sick, they do need frequent visits.  Hospital is a miserable place, and I imagine it’s quite lonely sitting there by yourself in pain with little other than the telly to take your mind off it – if you want to pay the $10/day to watch.  I’ve been hit up twice today as I needed to go home for lunch and to sort out some other stuff I’ve got going on, whilst I am still on holidays.  The other thing that drove me nuts this week when taking my relative in to be admitted to the PA, is that once you drop someone off in Emergency, there is no where within an easy distance to park, meaning it’s at least 20 minutes before you can get to your seriously ill family member or friend.  That being said, whilst my family member was pretty sick and was admitted straight away, there did seem to be a lot of people in the waiting room who did not look particularly sick or injured (except the woman who was having her hand strapped up by the guy at the registration desk as he took down her details).  I realise the health system has to address people who turn up to hospital with ailments that could be addressed by GPs (upping the amount reimbursed by Medicare would be a good start), but having inconvenient parking and 2 hour time restrictions on parking in the area is not a good way to do it.  Also I find it a little disconcerting having to go through the pscyh ward to get to the main hospital from the car park.  I know that I’m safe, but I also know that that’s the ward that gives most of my friend in health care the most grief.  It creeps me out and borders on inappropriate planning.

And finally, a few points on strategy.  I can not believe how few (read: none) hospitals are going into new areas in Brisbane and other expanding areas in Queensland.  No wonder there is such pressure on housing and accommodation in older areas that are still well serviced – living in the outer suburbs you really wouldn’t want to risk something like cardiac arrest as you wouldn’t get into a hospital on time.  And secondly there really needs to be more done to address chronic illnesses before they set in.  And not just colour coding tuckshop food for children – seriously funding cooking classes, quitting smoking services, alcohol rehab, etc.