Did you notice I added an s onto doctor? Dr. Thompson, his Pulmonologist (lung specialist) has joined in. We have been seeing him for about 4 years. John is a retired uranium miner, and a good portion of them have lung diseases. So far John has been lucky and has COPD but nothing too bad (meaning no cancer).
Anyway, this morning at 7 they sent in a technician to give him an ultrasound of his heart. Everything looked pretty good!
The doctor came around about 10. He had not yet looked at all the labs and stuff. He asked more questions, and we asked about the cramping John is getting in his hands and feet. We decided that may be an effect of the lasik and potassium that Dr. Barney put him on. So no more of that for now. Besides, perhaps they will get the problem with water on his legs figured out instead of just treating it!
The doctor said John will likely be in the hospital for a few more days.
I helped him in the shower and then he went for a walk. Not very far, but at least he had a little bit of activity.
Oh, did I tell you that he now has a voracious appetite?! Oh my gosh! Most of last week all he wanted was broth, ice water, and Popsicles. I don't know if he just didn't have the energy to eat more, or he was so waterlogged there was no room for food.
That is a whole other story! He has been sick with this and that for a few weeks now. It started when he was having major pain in the general area of his left kidney. That was on a Friday but he didn't say anything until that evening. The next morning we headed for the VA because it was hurting so bad. They figured he probably had a kidney stone. They did a CT and found what they thought was a tumor that was not distinguishable from the prostate. (He had prostate cancer 11 yrs ago.) So it being Saturday they sent us home until Monday when he could see the urologist. They did give us the option to head to the Denver VA, but we decided to ride it out here.
On that Monday we saw Dr. Roy, the urologist, and he did a cystoscopy. He did not find anything but also was not able to locate the opening to the kidney. He gave us some meds and sent us home. We got a call a couple of days later to set up a procedure to put a ureteric stent in place. Well he got the stent and had a nephrostomy tube with a urine bag coming out of his back to help drain the urine!
The next day Bridget gave us a challenge to do a layout with the word HOPE. Here is mine.
A couple of days later he was having a hard time urinating, and then he was going about every 10 minutes, but not much more than a dribble. I got him into the van and we went to the VA. He kept the urinal under his penis the whole way. All they did was give him some pain meds and send him home as there was nothing they could do for him over the weekend! So I went to Wally World to get some diapers for him.
So it has been a couple of weeks and we saw Dr. Barney last Wednesday. His offer was the lasik and potassium pills to decrease the water in John's legs and feet, and a Zpac for the infection in his sinuses. Then on Friday, Dr Roy put in the foley (his prostate is squeezing closed the ureter and that is why he was having a hard time going this time. He changed his meds again and gave us a medication for the probable infection in his bladder to start when he finished the Zpack.
So back to the appetite, the last ten days or so he has had little to no appetite. All he wanted was ICE water, popsicles and broth. I tried to give him vegetable soup and chicken noodle but all he wanted was the broth out of it, although a few times he had "cravings". In fact he would tell me ahead of time he thought he would have a craving for something and I better go get it so it would be on hand. Things like asparagus, spinach, vegetable juice, vienna fingers, ice cream sticks. And that would be all he wanted at the time, a bowl of spinach or ICE COLD vegetable juice. And of course after eating something cold we would then be freezing and have to have two comforters put over him so he could get warm. Then a few days ago he got his appetite back, for one meal a day. And he would eat more than usual. Then back to the other stuff.
Once they gave him that 1st unit of blood he started perking up a little. When they got him to his room they ordered him a tray. It was chipped beef, mashed potatoes and gravy and when he got his tray, he said wow that's a lot of food. But he ate every bit of it!
After that they took him downstairs to do a CT on his chest. They told us that it would be about 20 minutes. We thought that was enough time to go grab something to eat. We went down to the "cafe" but it was closed until 10pm. So we went to Taco Bell. We brought our food back to the room and a few minutes later they brought John back. That man ate half my dinner! I had three soft tacos and their new Mango/strawberry ice drink. He drank most of that and ate one and a half tacos. Within the hour he had a jello pudding to top it off! He has been eating like that ever since! Today he had a bowl of chocolate ice cream and a pudding and his three meals and some of my food.
We haven't learned anything new today, except that he does have a bladder infection, and they are treating that. They have also taken him off most of his meds and are only giving him his thyroid meds and one of the pills to treat his burning bladder feeling. This evening after dinner they sent him down for an MRI of his head.
In the morning they will give him a stress test at 9. That is most of what I know to this point. I will keep you informed.
Now on to the PREVIEW of tomorrow's download at ScrapHead. You can get it here.
Don't forget that Divine Digital also has download a day. Happy Scrapping,
Tess
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