- Joined
- Oct 18, 2007
- Messages
- 3,018
It's been a rough few weeks and it's just the start.
My mother, an emphysema sufferer had a bad cold a few weeks ago. My wife took her to her doc, who said it might be pneumonia, which was confirmed by her pulmonary doc. She got an x-ray - it showed bronchitis, not pneumonia - sort of good. Went to pick up antibiotics. Turned out her idiot doc, who she's had for umpteen years, prescribed her an antibiotic that she has a know allergy to. Thank God for the awesome pharmacist who caught that mistake. Since the idiot had closed office hours for the day and wasn't answering pages, the pharmacist called the local doc-in-a-box and got them to prescribe something else.
She sort of got better for a bit, but a week letter we all agreed it was time to take her to the hospital. Her oxygen levels were down, they gave her some steroids, everything was looking good and they released her in a couple of days.
She was home one day and was getting worse - stubborn Hungarian she is, she wouldn't let me take her to the hospital. The next day she could barely move, and I overrode her, carried her into my car and zipped off to the hospital.
Good thing I did. When I got her to the emergency room, her heart rate was around 200 and oxygen level was at 77%. They pumped her full of heart meds to try to get it under control. They got it to the point where it wasn't ridiculous then sent her to the CCU. At that point, they couldn't get her oxygen levels up high enough and her brain was turning to mush from the high CO2 levels so they had to intubate her. The docs informed me that in her state there was a 99.9% chance that she would never come off the respirator.
Two days later, she's off the respirator, talking, doing okay except for a somewhat elevated heart rate and nagging remnants of bronchitis.
Now the fun part begins. trying to get her into a rehabilitation center. she seems like she might be okay with that. She's still fighting me tooth-and-nail on having a visiting aide or nurse, and she's still not ready for me to mention assisted living or a nursing home. Wonderful woman that she is, she's hoarded and saved her whole life and doesn't want to lose what she's earned and wants to make sure it goes to me and my sister in the future.
Add on top of all of this, she's a compulsive pack rat, so we're trying to clean up her house, but it's going slow. There is no room to move in her place and everytime I've tried to touch stuff in the past, it's sent her into multiple day migraines. Too bad. this time it's getting clean (and empty). I hope it doesn't kill her when she sees it.
So, someone who wasn't as stubborn a Hungarian as her would have never gotten themselves into this mess. But also, someone who wasn't as stubborn as her and in this mess wouldn't be with us anymore.
My mother, an emphysema sufferer had a bad cold a few weeks ago. My wife took her to her doc, who said it might be pneumonia, which was confirmed by her pulmonary doc. She got an x-ray - it showed bronchitis, not pneumonia - sort of good. Went to pick up antibiotics. Turned out her idiot doc, who she's had for umpteen years, prescribed her an antibiotic that she has a know allergy to. Thank God for the awesome pharmacist who caught that mistake. Since the idiot had closed office hours for the day and wasn't answering pages, the pharmacist called the local doc-in-a-box and got them to prescribe something else.
She sort of got better for a bit, but a week letter we all agreed it was time to take her to the hospital. Her oxygen levels were down, they gave her some steroids, everything was looking good and they released her in a couple of days.
She was home one day and was getting worse - stubborn Hungarian she is, she wouldn't let me take her to the hospital. The next day she could barely move, and I overrode her, carried her into my car and zipped off to the hospital.
Good thing I did. When I got her to the emergency room, her heart rate was around 200 and oxygen level was at 77%. They pumped her full of heart meds to try to get it under control. They got it to the point where it wasn't ridiculous then sent her to the CCU. At that point, they couldn't get her oxygen levels up high enough and her brain was turning to mush from the high CO2 levels so they had to intubate her. The docs informed me that in her state there was a 99.9% chance that she would never come off the respirator.
Two days later, she's off the respirator, talking, doing okay except for a somewhat elevated heart rate and nagging remnants of bronchitis.
Now the fun part begins. trying to get her into a rehabilitation center. she seems like she might be okay with that. She's still fighting me tooth-and-nail on having a visiting aide or nurse, and she's still not ready for me to mention assisted living or a nursing home. Wonderful woman that she is, she's hoarded and saved her whole life and doesn't want to lose what she's earned and wants to make sure it goes to me and my sister in the future.
Add on top of all of this, she's a compulsive pack rat, so we're trying to clean up her house, but it's going slow. There is no room to move in her place and everytime I've tried to touch stuff in the past, it's sent her into multiple day migraines. Too bad. this time it's getting clean (and empty). I hope it doesn't kill her when she sees it.
So, someone who wasn't as stubborn a Hungarian as her would have never gotten themselves into this mess. But also, someone who wasn't as stubborn as her and in this mess wouldn't be with us anymore.
