DOCTORS BLAMED A ‘DRINK PROBLEM’ BUT I ONLY HAD A PINT A WEEK

Mike Tebbutt, 61 (left), a retired paramedic, lives in Tenby, South Wales, with his wife Ruth, 60, a retired learning support assistant. They have two daughters. WORKING as a paramedic I’d seen someone vomit blood and die on the spot. So when I woke up at 3am one day and started vomiting blood, I was scared to death. My wife called an ambulance and my vomiting started again in A&E. Blood tests and a scan showed I had a liver problem, and the doctors assumed it must be alcoholrelated. I wasn’t a drinker, though, and told them this — I drank a pint of beer a week at most, but they kept questioning my family about my drinking. I was then transferred to the liver service at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, where I had a biopsy, which confirmed I had cirrhosis caused by fat building up in my liver because I was overweight. The vomiting blood was caused by internal bleeding due to liver damage.

The disease was so advanced the scarring and stiffness in my liver couldn’t be reversed, and my specialist said that I’d need a liver transplant in the next few years.

I was devastated. Looking back though, I should have known my health was at risk — at 18 st (114 kg) and 5 ft 11 tall — my BMI was 35 and I was inactive. I also had high blood pressure and high cholesterol. My weight had

crept up. At work I was often sitting down and I was always buying crisps at petrol stations and eating at odd times of the day.

The doctors said there was no treatment and I went downhill over the next few years, with visits to the hospital every few weeks. During one visit, a doctor asked when I was going to stop drinking. I was furious that he hadn’t even read my notes.

Eventually my liver started to fail, and in January 2009 I was put on the transplant list. I could then hardly walk and had lost most of my speech.

By the day of the transplant ten months later, so much fluid had built up in my abdomen I weighed 20st. The surgeon said that if I didn’t have the transplant that day I had 36 hours to live.

Having the transplant operation in March 2009 was like flicking a switch — I felt better almost instantly and was out of hospital doing the shopping with my daughter ten days later.

I’ve stayed well ever since and have got my weight down to 15st. At my last appointment, my consultant shook my hand and said all my liver test results were perfect and I was a credit to them. But I know I’m very lucky to still be here.