Indium scan on deck
Yesterday was fairly mellow. Denise was sedated or asleep most of the time and we didn't interact much. I did a lot of reading. Last night she finally started to wake up and asked about the baby. I told her the usual response "Don't worry... he's doing perfect, very well taken care of." She indicated that she wanted me to leave her and go visit the baby.
The doctor called earlier this morning with the latest. Fevers are still high and they don't know why. So they're going to do an Indium scan. They will take some of her white blood cells, tag them with Indium (radioactive), put the cells back in her, and the cells will accumulate at the site of infection. They can then scan her body and find where all the white cells are hanging out. Then a proper course of action can be determined.
She's back on IV feeding (TPN); feeding through the gastro tube has been halted for a while. Between the protein/nutrition problems and vomit problems, IV feeding seems to be a better bet for now.
Chest x-rays have been showing some more improvement. As far as the vent, the oxygen concentration has been between 28 & 35, PEEP set to 5. When she's not stressed & anxious, her breathing rate is in the mid-teens. There's talk of making changes in the coming days to begin allowing her to assume more of the work of breathing on her own.
There seem to be no indications anymore of DIC (that weird clotting problem). The concerns of SPT (septic pelvic thromboflibitis) are also fading, however she's still on preventative doses of Lovenox.
Blood cultures for all infections (cocci, pseudomonas aeruginosa, c. dif) have been coming back negative the last 3 times and the latest paracentesis also came back negative (yay!). But she still has to be on the meds for a while to wallop the infections (like when you're on antibiotics, the bottle says to take all the pills until they're gone, even though you don't have the symptoms anymore). For those that like to hear the play-by-play, she's on Diflucan for the valley fever (cocci), Flaggyl, Vancomycin, and Xifaxan (rifazimin) for the c. dif, and Amicacin and Zyvox (linezolid) for the pseudomonas. Throw that stuff in a Martini glass with an olive, because it sounds like quite a cocktail, doesn't it?
The doctor called earlier this morning with the latest. Fevers are still high and they don't know why. So they're going to do an Indium scan. They will take some of her white blood cells, tag them with Indium (radioactive), put the cells back in her, and the cells will accumulate at the site of infection. They can then scan her body and find where all the white cells are hanging out. Then a proper course of action can be determined.
She's back on IV feeding (TPN); feeding through the gastro tube has been halted for a while. Between the protein/nutrition problems and vomit problems, IV feeding seems to be a better bet for now.
Chest x-rays have been showing some more improvement. As far as the vent, the oxygen concentration has been between 28 & 35, PEEP set to 5. When she's not stressed & anxious, her breathing rate is in the mid-teens. There's talk of making changes in the coming days to begin allowing her to assume more of the work of breathing on her own.
There seem to be no indications anymore of DIC (that weird clotting problem). The concerns of SPT (septic pelvic thromboflibitis) are also fading, however she's still on preventative doses of Lovenox.
Blood cultures for all infections (cocci, pseudomonas aeruginosa, c. dif) have been coming back negative the last 3 times and the latest paracentesis also came back negative (yay!). But she still has to be on the meds for a while to wallop the infections (like when you're on antibiotics, the bottle says to take all the pills until they're gone, even though you don't have the symptoms anymore). For those that like to hear the play-by-play, she's on Diflucan for the valley fever (cocci), Flaggyl, Vancomycin, and Xifaxan (rifazimin) for the c. dif, and Amicacin and Zyvox (linezolid) for the pseudomonas. Throw that stuff in a Martini glass with an olive, because it sounds like quite a cocktail, doesn't it?
posted by Phil and Denise Williams at 11:35 AM
1 Comments:
We are all thinking and praying for you everyday- Thanks for the updates- and for taking the time to input them. If the kids come to Illinois to visit I would love to have them for a few days. If there is anything I can do to help please let me know-
Denise you are a strong individual-keep up the fight.
Misty, Jason and Lilian Lay
and the Powell Family
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