I've just been to the doctor's

[Wowbagger]

I went to get him to sign a couple of medical certificates for an insurance claim I'm putting on for our wrecked holiday last week, and my singing course, which I should have been on this week, and he got me to do certain things.

I had a Peak Flow test, which I've never had before. That came out at 550, which is pretty good, apparently, for an old bugger with a throat infection. He weighed me - 115kg in my clothes, which is considerably less than our bathroom scales say, and he took my blood pressure, which was a bit unsporting and caused him some concern - 168/89. It's normally a lot lower than that. I pointed out that I've been putting on weight lately, largely becuase I'm a fat greedy bastard the weather has been so bad that I've scarcely been out on my bike.

I've got to go back again and see what the BP is next time round. I suspect I'll be bunged on another lot of tablets, which is a pain. I've carefully avoided blood pressure tablets up to now.

[Kim]

550's pretty good for a rookie.  Peak flow is a useful measure for quickly determining your height, shoulder width and how good you are at using peak flow meters.  Beware that lung problems may sometimes (but not always) cause a misleadingly low reading, so if in doubt it's better to measure height by dividing your mass by your BMI and taking the square root.

[clarion]

It's about 150 more than I can do at my best.  And almost twice what I have been managing in recent weeks.

[numbnuts]

I too had a Peak Flow test the other day due to having emphysema I scored 615, the nurse could not believe I had emphysema until I told her I have very large lungs.

[peliroja]

My usual peak flow is low to mid 300s. This may explain why I have to work quite hard at physical stuff and struggle to speak when exercising, even when I'm at my fittest.

[Trull]

As an asthmatic I've done a fair few of these, I always manage to slam the pointer into the other end at the 800+ mark. Perhaps my formative years competitively playing the Highland Bagpipes had some positive effect!