Back at Barnes

Some of you may have saw on Facebook that Dad was back in the hospital. Saturday night Mikayla had to call an ambulance for him because while he was using the bathroom, his legs gave out and Mom was barely able to catch him and prevent him from falling onto the ground. Mikayla and Mom were able to get him into a wheelchair but Mom knew something wasn't right. I was actually at work and went over to Fire/EMS dispatch and called Mikayla and watched the GPS on the ambulance that was en route over there. Medics determined he was stable but decided to transport him to Barnes St. Peters to get checked out. Once at the ER, they treated him for dehydration (he hadn't eaten or drank much that day) and were waiting for lab results to come back and then most likely release him. They decided to do a CT scan just to check everything out which revealed that there was some significant swelling in his brain as well as some bleeding.

At that point, the St. Peters doctors talked to the Big Barnes doctors and decided to transport him downtown between 4 and 5 am on Sunday morning. Being a 911 operator has it's advantages, I was able to let Mom and Kayla know when the ambulance was on it's way to transport him! Most of the day Sunday was just a waiting and observation day with an increase of steroids to try and help the swelling. He did seem to be feeling better by that point.

This morning (Monday), Mom, Mikayla, and I all got up to the hospital around 9:30 am. Dad was very agitated and not like himself at all. Physical therapy was able to get him moving around a little bit and he went from the hospital bed into the recliner with only a little difficulty. He didn't have his cane and being at the hospital, have to move and hold onto things a little bit differently than he would at home. 

 After therapy left, he took a nap and woke up when they came to get him for an MRI. There was some debate over whether or not he was going to be able to take a Xanax before the MRI (he's been taking one before MRI's to help with claustrophobia) due to him being very sleepy. They don't like to give Xanax in those types of cases because it can slow and ultimately stop your breathing. However the doctor did give the OK for him to have it before his MRI. When he got back from the MRI, he seemed much more like himself, was making jokes, not agitated, and was asking for lunch. He finished off some pasta Kayla and I had for lunch and then was asking for sweets and ate some smarties (shockingly, didn't ask for orange sherbert!).

We got the MRI results back fairly quickly and it looks like the original tumor as well as the new "tumor" we've been watching look fairly stable compared to his last MRI, however there looks like there's some inflammation where the necrosis (damaged tissue from radiation) is, or what we refer to as the second spot.  Overall, the swelling and the bleeding have decreased since the CT scan but there is still some minor spots of both. Due to the bleeding, they haven't put him on any blood thinners to prevent blood clots in his legs.

Dad doesn't know this, but unless Dr. Ansstas (the primary oncologist) has something different to say, he will probably be released from the hospital either tomorrow or Wednesday. They said he could either go to another rehab facility place for some extensive physical therapy or if we were comfortable taking him home and doing home health and having a physical therapist come to the house, they were okay with that. Obviously, Dad would prefer to come home so as of right now, that is the plan. We haven't told Dad any of this because he tends to fixate on things and if we say he might come home on Tuesday and they end up keeping him, he'll get agitated and upset. He doesn't have much sense of time anymore and easily gets confused. He might think something that happened six hours ago just happened an hour ago or vice versa. This is his new "normal" though, ever since he had all those seizures back in August.

I think that's everything that happened over the weekend. As usual, keep us in your prayers and if anyone would like to come visit, give Mom a call!!!

Seizure Doctor Visit

So this week, the family met with a doctor that specializes in seizures and seizure control. This was a doctor that Dr. A had recommended we see to help keep in control of the seizures. We learned that while Dad was in the hospital back in August, he had 27 seizures over a 2.5-3 day span while he was hooked up to the video/brain wave monitoring. Definitely not something you want the high score in!!!! These seizures were seen only in brain waves and they were near the right side of the brain near the edges of the tumor, according to the specialist.

At this point with his medication, we have to weigh the benefits and the risks of altering his medication. We think his extreme tiredness is partially caused by the seizure medication, however changing his medications too much could cause more seizures to occur which we obviously want to avoid. At this point we are not going to make any changes and just see how things go. We'll go back in 6 months for a follow up appointment.

Next week we have another MRI (already, time has flown!) to check the 3rd spot and see if there have been any changes. Prayers for good results would be appreciated!!!