Back in ICU...

After I left, I heard that she worked with the Physical Therapist. She was putting lotion on her legs, even with her right hand. She lifted her right leg all the way up to pull her sock off. And then the Physical Therapist asked her to put them back on. I guess mom was not happy about that. She put the left one on quickly and the right one was a little bit harder. She was getting tired, especially on the right side - but she still did it. Then she asked her if she was ready to lay down. Mom definitely was, and was already reclining when the PT said "Wait! Give me a high five!" Mom did (with her right hand), lifting her hand up to her shoulder level. She needed a little help straightening her fingers out, but it was definitely progress.

Five minutes later, her Speech Therapist walked in. Mom refused, shaking her head. She was exhausted from the PT workout.

About 15 minutes later, they took her down to prep for surgery, which started at 3. Her nurse came in and told my dad, not to be surprised if she was taken to ICU after the procedure. I wrote a previous post with the details I had received about the surgery briefing. I'm told they also took an xray to make sure she didn't have a collapsed lung.

So when I got here about 5:30pm, she had just been brought up to her room from the surgical recovery area. She was in a fit of pain and fever, with high blood pressure and low oxygen levels. The nurse came in and was really concerned about her breathing. They had to bring her oxygen up from 4 liters to 15 liters (huge increase) to keep her levels above 90, and even at that, it had been dipping. Her fever was over 102 and her blood pressure was over 200. The nurse called in help immediately and quickly put an oxygen mask on her. They administered Tylenol to break her fever. They also gave her blood pressure medication and a series of meds for stomach pains.

Dr. Warner, an ICU pulmologist was called (same one who saw her in the ER and ICU when we arrived) and she assured us that her lungs were not collapsed. She ordered an ABG blood test to double check oxygen immediately and also send out for cultures to check for bacterial infections. The ABG came back quickly, and she said actually it showed better levels than the room monitor and comforted us a bit by saying that the test should be a more accurate reading. Nevertheless, the whole situation was cause enough to put her back into ICU. She will need more frequent monitoring and the ratio of nurse/patients will allow that. She'll also have access to an ICU pulmologist, which is important to all of us. Better safe than sorry and I think we're all happy she's been moved.

Dr. Warner retouched on the fact that the mass was scraped during the bronchoscopy which caused bleeding. Without having to try to repeat her explanation, she did say that it's not unusual for oxygen levels to decrease when this happens and it will eventually work itself back as the body heals. However, there is also a slight chance that mom may need a blood transfusion. The ABG blood test will indicate that.

Another concern is that they had to pump fluids into her lungs to do the procedure and since she is still not able to cough productively, it's - well it's not good. I'm not sure if they said there is a way to pump it out - it was getting really crazy in the room at that time.

Well, here we are back in ICU. I'm not saying that it's not serious, because it is - but I'm relieved that by the time we got her to her new room, she seemd a bit more relaxed, her fever had broke and she was more responsive to us. She still has the oxygen mask on and I guess it's just another waiting game now.

Please continue to pray.

xox,
Tommy