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Notes from the Infirmary
Feb. 9th, 2011 11:18 pm(crossposted to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kshandra and gridlore)
So the plan today was for me to take Doug to his appointment with his pulmonologist, since I hadn't met her yet, and then head into work after that. Yeah, not so much....
The nurse took him back to get his vitals, and his pulse-ox reading was 72%. Considering the lowest I had ever seen his sats before was 97%, I found this slightly alarming. So did the nurse, who set him up in the exam room with a portable meter, saying "Leave that on until the doctor comes in." This one was reading in the low-to-mid 80s, but still, Not Good.
When Dr. Butcher came in, she did a quick review with Doug, listened to his lungs, and said "Okay, you may still have asthma, but this is something else entirely, and we need to get you into the hospital to figure out what." (At which point I looked at him and said "So naturally, we didn't bring your crash-bag today...") She excused herself to make some calls and set things in motion; when she came back, she let us know that we were expected in the ER, operating on the theory that they would be able to get any necessary testing done faster there.
His appointment was at 10; I finally left around 2:40 to come home, eat breakfast (yeah, bad Koosh), and pick up his crash-bag (books, iPod/headphones, etc.). I was home for about two hours, which I mostly spent decompressing (and needed it by then). I was just getting out of the car back at the hospital when Doug called me to let me know that he hadn't been admitted yet, and could I please bring him a soda?
So I went off to the cafeteria before heading back to his bed. Once again, my poor husband is trapped in a building stocked with Pepsi products. (Which at least meant I could get a Diet Dr Pepper for myself.)
I get security to buzz me back into the main section of the department, and Doug brings me up to speed.... The CT scan of his chest showed multiple blood clots in his lungs. (One of the descriptions Doug has kept coming back to throughout this ordeal was that it felt like there was a trap door welded shut; the spot he had been pointing to in that description matches up with the location of one of the clots.) This is, in a word, Bad. They've started him on blood thinners (not heparin, which is what they used for the portal vein thrombosis he had post-op in '95; he didn't catch the name, though), and want to keep him for a day or two while they monitor his progress and make sure the clots actually shrink/dissolve/whatever. Once he's released, he'll be on a follow-up regimen of Coumadin (for how long, he didn't say).
...and I appear to have just run out of words, so I'll stop here. As always, thank you ALL for your good wishes.
kshandra and gridlore)So the plan today was for me to take Doug to his appointment with his pulmonologist, since I hadn't met her yet, and then head into work after that. Yeah, not so much....
The nurse took him back to get his vitals, and his pulse-ox reading was 72%. Considering the lowest I had ever seen his sats before was 97%, I found this slightly alarming. So did the nurse, who set him up in the exam room with a portable meter, saying "Leave that on until the doctor comes in." This one was reading in the low-to-mid 80s, but still, Not Good.
When Dr. Butcher came in, she did a quick review with Doug, listened to his lungs, and said "Okay, you may still have asthma, but this is something else entirely, and we need to get you into the hospital to figure out what." (At which point I looked at him and said "So naturally, we didn't bring your crash-bag today...") She excused herself to make some calls and set things in motion; when she came back, she let us know that we were expected in the ER, operating on the theory that they would be able to get any necessary testing done faster there.
His appointment was at 10; I finally left around 2:40 to come home, eat breakfast (yeah, bad Koosh), and pick up his crash-bag (books, iPod/headphones, etc.). I was home for about two hours, which I mostly spent decompressing (and needed it by then). I was just getting out of the car back at the hospital when Doug called me to let me know that he hadn't been admitted yet, and could I please bring him a soda?
So I went off to the cafeteria before heading back to his bed. Once again, my poor husband is trapped in a building stocked with Pepsi products. (Which at least meant I could get a Diet Dr Pepper for myself.)
I get security to buzz me back into the main section of the department, and Doug brings me up to speed.... The CT scan of his chest showed multiple blood clots in his lungs. (One of the descriptions Doug has kept coming back to throughout this ordeal was that it felt like there was a trap door welded shut; the spot he had been pointing to in that description matches up with the location of one of the clots.) This is, in a word, Bad. They've started him on blood thinners (not heparin, which is what they used for the portal vein thrombosis he had post-op in '95; he didn't catch the name, though), and want to keep him for a day or two while they monitor his progress and make sure the clots actually shrink/dissolve/whatever. Once he's released, he'll be on a follow-up regimen of Coumadin (for how long, he didn't say).
...and I appear to have just run out of words, so I'll stop here. As always, thank you ALL for your good wishes.