Babygirl is stable, improving slowly but steadily in general, but there are, as always, glitches.
Her kidney numbers were steadily declining while on dialysis, which is, of course, the expected outcome but not at all helpful in deciding if the kidney itself is improving. When I arrived this afternoon, she was off dialysis, and they were giving her Lasix (water pills, only IV). Now, critical care is not my area of expertise, but I couldn't puzzle out the why of those choices, entirely. (One of the unintended consequences of the Covid visitation restrictions is that family cannot attend morning rounds to hear what the doctors know/think.) But I have updated her MyChart and can see all of her labs.
So here is what I know: Everything kidney-related appears fairly normal except that she is still in kidney failure (Creatinine down to just under 4, still not good). And for some reason, someone ordered a test that assess cardiac strain, a BNP, which was wildly elevated, so there IS significant strain. Lasix is used for both sluggish kidneys AND heart failure, so.... out of my league here.
I have not heard that there are any positive blood cultures, but final results on those can take days. No further word on the abscess germs either. Antibiotics continue.
Babygirl was up and drinking quite a bit of fluid. She had pancakes for breakfast, but ate nothing else for the remainder of the day due to ongoing nausea. She continues to be photophobic (extremely light sensitive) with headaches off and on. This could be migraine, or.......I don't know what.
She was able to carry on conversations with me all afternoon while I diligently combed 52 billion tangles out of her hair (removing unspeakable horrors from the tangles as I went. Remember, she's been vomiting a lot and has had 2 fairly bloody procedures done!) But I noticed, as we talked, that almost nothing we discussed was "sticking." About the only thing she seemed to process was that Betty White had died (?), and the rest of everything was, well, circular. Like goldfish brain.
Given how ill she was just 40 hours ago, I can't say if this is going to be ongoing or if she'll get more cognitive improvement, but I'll vote for improvement on the "its too soon to be certain" side of the coin.
On the lighter side, I went to my old friend Mark Ballard's church this morning. It was the exact rest my brain and soul needed.
AND as an additional bonus, Tony and Judy Hipes came up and took me for dinner. I'm going to find that diner on Uber and order some Buffalo mac and cheese for dinner tomorrow LOL.
DeeDee
No comments:
Post a Comment