The Measure of Me

Bacteria, Biometrics, and the Bristol Stool Chart

This week, during my latest stay at Wellington Hospital (ten days so far and counting), my doctors have introduced a new yardstick to the many measures and metrics of my health: The Bristol Stool Chart.

It all began a couple of weeks ago, with a mysterious Saturday Night Fever that fell to a Sunday Malaise, then flared up to a Forty-one degree Temperature by the Monday night, leading to a Tuesday morning ambulance ride to Wellington Hospital to be treated for sepsis.

Initially, the source of my infection was a mystery. Despite being pumped with fluids, my temperature stayed swelteringly high, my blood pressure stubbonly refused to come up. A phalanx of flummoxed physicians sent in a flurry of phlebotomists to sample my blood.

Eventually, by the third day, I was diagnosed with gastroenteritis (specifically, Campylobacterosis). Insisting that deploying a course of antibiotics would escalate the conflict, my doctors instead laid out a plan of appeasement: to ride out the infection’s attack and “let my body do the work”. No reinforcements would be sent in. Instead, we would simply measure the advance and hope for an eventual retreat. Nurses would measure my blood pressure, temperature and oxygen saturation and of course scale of pain; phlebotomists would regularly sample my blood to measure kidney function, liver function and immune response; and I was tasked with measuring output, using the Bristol Stool Chart.

In an age of pervasive, sophisticated biometrics, the Bristol Stool Chart boldly goes where no Fitbit dares to go, introducing a scientifically validated classification of your poo. Armed with The Bristol Stool Chart, the patient observes and dutifully records the frequency and type of fecal excretions, guided by a table of seven evocative illustrations on the Chart. No poo is equal. A hierarchy of poo quality is implied by this scale but is not stated on the sheet, presumably to avoid patient despair (or indeed, alarm).

By the way, I do not know why the designers of the Bristol Stool Chart named it in dubious honour of England’s eighth largest city. Perhaps something reminded them of home. Here is the chart:

In any case, over the next few days I dutifully diarised my defecatory output. With all aspects of bodily function now tracked, we lay back and waited.

What should have been a fairly straightforward recuperation was unfortunately confounded by a second infection, a phlebitis of the IV site into my right arm, leading to fever and sepsis again. Which is why I'm still here in hospital, now on antibiotics, waiting for this second infection to dissipate.

Thankfully, my original infection has now retreated and all but disappeared. My temperature is normal, my blood pressure healthy and my Bristol Stool Chart now makes for dull reading, for even the most enthusiastic gastroenterologist. So we wait for the second infection to pass. All of this hasn't made for the most pleasant time in hospital, but sometimes you just have to flush the dunny, and move on…