Long Weekend at the hospital

[Road King Cole]

My Mom was in ICU all weekend (since Thursday) with a really bad track infection and her heart was in AFIB. Her heart is now out of AFIB and the blood pressure is starting to come back to normal. It seems like she is turning the corner. Advice for everyone: don't take your loved ones to a crappy local hospital for anything. Go to a good one even it is a much longer drive no matter what the ailment is. Once you’re in, it's difficult to change to a better hospital (unless the patient requests it, my mom doesn’t want to go to Boston). Knowing the hospital sucks (they pretty much neglected\killed may dad last year) and being constantly reminded of this just makes it even more stressful. I hate that hospital (Tobey).

[chumbucket]

Best wishes for your Mom for full recovery.

[RidgeRunner]

Thought and prayers go out. What timing, right at the holidays. Glad to hear she has turned the corner, couldn't agree more about hospitals, same goes for doctors. My in-laws refuse to question my mother-in-laws doctors about her medical induced zombie like state. She had a bad bout and was in ICU at a quality hospital earlier this year where they took her off most of her medication, to our surprise she was more alert and talkative than she had been for over a year. We tried to get the doctors to listen as we are convinced there is some bad drug interaction that is surpressing her personality but to no avail. Just as soon as she got back on her normal medication she went back into her coma like state. This is a woman that would tell you how to build the watch when you asked her the time. Over the entire course of x-mas day she might have said 12 words.

[phatdaddy]

hang tough, rkc. a year ago my dad was in the hospital with afib, put him on heparin to stablize and then weaned him on koumidin(rat poison). finally got the meds straight and his heart is doin ok. he did the ablation procedure about 6 months ago and it didn't work very well.

[macojoe]

I hate TOBEY!!! When I had my heart attack in th spring I went there and then got transferred to St. Lukes, that was better.
I use to live on the Cape and went to Cape Cod Hos and they are great!! I and my wife always go there if possible. And Tobey is only 5 min away from my house now.

Hope all goes well!!

[nipper]

Had a similar experience when my Dad was being treated at South Shore Hospital before he died. Nice facilities, really nice people, but with all the world class hospitals just 10-15 miles away in Boston, just kept thinking we could do better for my old man. That is where my Mom wanted him to be treated though, and you need to keep the patient's and those closest to the patient's wishes in mind.

[Road King Cole]

Just after writing that I got an update that she was getting worse. I was able to convince her to go to Boston and we got her into Beth Israel.

Looks like it will be a long week...

Oh, this morning Tobey was guessing "H1N1", we had to don robes, masks and gloves to enter the room. It's not H1N1, idiots.

[CaptJ]

Prayers to your mom and family... hope everything turns better.

[Road King Cole]

OK, I have been hesitant to post an update as it has just been just a roller coaster ride and I have been so busy between work and going to the Hospital. Took my Mom to Beth Israel in Boston over a week ago. Her health was declining and they intubated her. New years eve she was declining so fast that they expected her to live another 2-4 hours. Then she "stabilized" and she has been slowly recovering one day and then not doing well another. My Mom has actually been getting much better for a couple days now!

Her white blood count is down from 50K to 21K (5-10K is normal). They are talking about taking her off the respirator soon. They think she does not have cancer, but they actually don't know what the "infection" is...

[chumbucket]

Well that's better news. We will continue to keep her in our prayers for a speedy recovery.