The beginners guide to Thermotherapy and rectal probes.

Earlier as I entered the clinic following my hunt for soap and shampoo I was greeted by one of the nurses, her name I have yet to memorise. She handed me four large plastic bottles and said something I could not quite comprehend, so she resorted to charades.

Clasping her hands together in what I initially thought was a fairly good golfing pose she indicated to me that I was to "wee wee" into the bottles for the next 24 hours.

How the heck she thinks I could possibly fill four one litre bottles in a day and for what reason I have no idea. So far 8 hours later, I've only managed about 150ml. I may need to cheat to preserve my manhood. (I wonder if the Asparagus soup from tonight's dinner will suffice).





Dr Glonti phoned and asked that I meet him downstairs. I took a quick pee in one of the bottles and headed down, I'm gonna crack 200ml if it kills me!

Downstairs could be anywhere in this place, it's a rabbit warren. I asked the girl in the office where I might find Dr G and she led me down into the bowels of the building to a room fitted out with what looked like an over-sized pizza oven and a bath. I had a feeling things were going to get weird, just how weird I had no idea!

Dr G sat me down and explained how Thermotherapy worked to help kill cancer cells by heating them to 39C. (The observation, that cancer patients who experienced a feverish period after surgery survived significantly longer than patients without fever and the fact, that spontaneous tumor remission was observed mostly after a fever period, was the rationale behind the therapy).

Anyway I digress, I was asked to completely disrobe while Dr G ran me a nice hot bath, complete with bubbles and scented with pine. This was starting to all look very cosy.

I got into the bath and soaked for about 20 minutes in water that was probably hot enough to add goat cheese croutons and call it a soup.

Dr G asked me to remove myself from the water and position myself in the 'pizza oven'.
An IV saline drip was connected to the cannula I have permanently inserted in my arm.
He then attached various sensors all around my body. One to my right ear for monitoring my oxygen levels, ECG leads to my chest, a band around my right arm to monitor blood pressure, then a clip to my left index finger for heart rate.

I wondered to myself how he was planning to monitor my temperature.

It's at this point our cosy little 'date' (and I use the word deliberately) took a turn for the worse.

Out came a long cable, running in one direction to one of those machines that go 'bing' and in the other direction to a 100mm long probe that looked suspiciously like it had been coated in KY jelly. I took a deep breath and thought of home.

After being wrapped in several towels, he zipped up the sides of the chamber and flicked the four switches that turned on the infra-red heat lamps. My head was mercifully left outside the chamber, protruding from an opening in the thick blue padding that made up the sides of my prison. A fan was aimed at my face for comfort, making the hair in my noise tickle.

Every ten minutes the doctor would take my blood pressure and write down the various readings from my many probes. If I twisted my head around I could just see the machine that went "bing" and I watched the temperature slowly rise to 39C. I can honestly say this was the hottest 'date' I've ever had!

Once we achieved 39C the covers were removed from the machine and I was zipped in a thick silver thermal blanket and left to baste in my own sweat for another 30 minutes or so. Oddly my temperature continued to climb, peaking at 39.2 and remaining there for quite some time. The Doctor had told me that if at any time did I feel uncomfortable he would stop the treatment, I wished he had said that before, rather than after the insertion of the temperature probe!

I think all those lazy nights spent in our spa pool back home have conditioned me to the heat because it really wasn't all that bad.

Dr G gave me instructions on how much water to drink (got to fill those bottles), when to eat and to go back to my room and lay down for two hours. (There was no mention of hot showers and endless scrubbing).

I walked slowly upstairs, entered my room, carefully sat down and began to write my blog..