Greg Covid - Day 21 Infection Continues

Before church this morning, I spoke to Amanda, Greg's nurse.  He didn't have too many big changes.  They stopped the Lasix drip this morning.  He put out about 2 liters, which was really good result and should make it a little easier for him not having all that extra fluid around his lungs and heart.   There were no changes on the vent.  They had to go up a little on blood pressure meds, but was expected because of the amount of fluid he lost.  He had no high fevers and his blood pressure looks good.  He looks very comfortable.    

I spoke with Dr. John around 4:30 today.  He is currently on pressure support on the vent, so he is breathing on his own.  His oxygenation has been mid-80’s to lower 90’s today.  They haven't changed the vent settings since yesterday and he is still on sedation to keep him comfortable.  They increased his tube feeding to improve his nutrition.  The other problem is the infection.  They talked to an infectious disease doctor yesterday and changed the antibiotic to Cefepime, which is the strongest antibiotic they can use and treats many kinds of bacterial infections, including severe or life-threatening forms.   His blood cultures are still positive, so the bacteria is not gone yet.   They will repeat cultures every day.  Greg's primary problem are his lungs.  He needs time for his lungs to recover.  We are still working on that and he is still fighting.  His oxygen requirement is still pretty high.  He just needs time to get better. 

They are going to do a Covid test today and if it's negative, they will repeat it tomorrow.  He has to have two negative tests to be removed from isolation and for us to be able to visit with him.  They understand the importance of family coming to visit, but they have to follow their rules.  

Please pray that his Covid tests come back negative so we can go visit him!  I firmly believe that if he can hear me and feel me holding his hand, that it will make a huge difference.  Having the kids visit will make a big difference for him, too!  

Please also pray that they are able to get a handle on whatever bacterial infection he has in his blood.  We need the antibiotics to work to get rid of that infection!  

Finally, please pray for Greg's lungs to begin healing. 

Here, Greg is modeling a t-shirt I made for him a couple years ago  I'm going to have to figure out another one to make for him when he gets out of the hospital! Just more proof of what a fighter he is!    

 Love, Peace and Prayers to all, 

Julie

Greg Covid - Day 16 -- Tracheostomy Surgery Tomorrow!

I spoke with Greg's nurse early this morning and he had a good night.  HIs temperature was hovering right around 101.  She changed his vent settings and he seemed to tolerate it a little better.   His peep was down to 8, which was good.  The vent is at 60% and on CPAP mode again.  He seems to be doing a lot better with that.    

I spoke with his doctor around 1:15 p.m., but after about a minute or so of conversation, suddenly I heard a lot of commotion in the background and I heard someone say "he coded."  Then Greg's doctor said "he coded?"  He then told me that there was an emergency and he had to go and would call me back.  He called back about 25 minutes later and let me tell you that those were the LONGEST 25 minutes of my life!   I was trying to work and pray that it wasn't Greg, and that if it was that he'd be OK, and if it wasn't that whoever it was would be OK.    When the doctor called me back I immediately asked if it was Greg and he said no, and then I asked if the person who did was OK and he said yes, he is OK.  So, praise God that everyone was OK after that scare!   

His surgery has been rescheduled for 10:45 a.m., and I will be at the hospital to speak with the doctor when the surgery is done.  Unfortunately, I was told today that Greg cannot be tested again for Covid until 20 days from first diagnosis, so he can't be tested again until Monday, which means that I will not be able to see him tomorrow.   I'm pretty bummed about that, but there is nothing I can do about it.  

The next news the doctor gave me was that they have decided NOT to give Greg the PEG (feeding) tube tomorrow.  I asked why and he said that they believe Greg will be able to recover enough to eat on his own at this point without needing a feeding tube!  I was a little leery, so I asked him point blank:  "or, does it mean that you don't think he'll make it, so why bother with the feeding tube?"  He immediately assured me that if they didn't think he was going to make it, they wouldn't even do the trach."  So, that is good news!  All the prayers are working!  

I'm starting to look at long-term care facilities, and there are a few in the Colby-Abbotsford area that are in-network with our insurance, so I'll start doing some investigating and impromptu visits so I can get him in the best facility possible when the time comes.  

So, that's the update for today.  Greg is holding steady and I'm praying that once he's got the trach he'll really start turning around.  He doesn't like the vent and "fights" it when they try to turn the anesthesia down, and doesn't breathe properly and his blood pressure goes up, so with the trach, he'll be a lot more comfortable, and they'll be able to reduce his anesthesia and he'll start getting better and better!  

Today's picture of Greg is one that just cracks me up!  This is one from an old photo album, so I had to take a picture of it with my cell phone.  It wasn't the best quality to begin with, but it's still a pretty awesome pic! 

Before we were married (I think about 1985 or so), we were tent camping in one of Wisconsin's beautiful State Parks (I don't remember which one).  Greg always had really bad allergies prior to his transplant (thanks, Tommy for not having allergies!) and if you know Greg, you know that to this day, he always has a farmer hankie with him.  At the time of this pic, Greg and I were playing frisbee, and his hankie was getting, uhm, shall we say ucky, so he tied it on the power line thingee to dry out and would walk over there to blow his nose whenever he needed to!  He's such a goofball!  Is it any wonder I fell in love with him?  

Please continue your prayers for Greg!  Please pray that his surgery goes well tomorrow, without any complications.  Pray for a good night for him tonight, and pray that his fever comes down. 

Greg Covid - Day 14 I kind of "talked" to Greg last night!

 I spoke with Greg's nurse, Julie, last night.  I really like her!  She's very sweet and easy to talk to.  Greg is doing OK, but they had to turn on norepinephrine for his blood pressure, because it was getting quite low.  They turned on around 5:30.  She said they can run a very low dose through a regular IV, but if you start running it higher, there is risk of damaging the vessel.  Doctors talked it over and decided to put a central line in again at around 7 p.m.  They will assess and make sure that he doesn’t need the norepinephrine any more before removing it.  Otherwise, no significant change today.  He vent is on PRVC mode, which allows for different settings, as opposed to spontaneous mode.  He was having a little more difficulty breathing, so they decided to keep him on this mode and increased sedation a little to help him relax more.  Right now his rate on the vent is 18 and his respiratory rate is 24-25, so he still breathing over the vent, but not in the 40’s. 

His temperature is still fluctuating, so he is still on Tylenol.  Currently at 102.4.  "We have seen a trend with covid patienst having very fluctuating temps.  It varies greatly."  They also turned the temperature down in his room to help keep him cool .  

Otherwise, things are all right.  It would be better if he didn’t need the blood pressure meds due to low blood pressure.   It’s still going to be a long process and he's going to have some ups and downs.  This is something that we see and sometimes the down will take several days of being down before he starts back up again.  It can really vary a lot.  Every patient is different. 

When I started talking to Julie about how hard it is to not be able to see him, or hold his hand, or even talk to him, she suggested that she could call me from Greg's room and prop the phone next to his ear so I could talk to him.  So, ten minutes later, she called me back and I spent 15 minutes talking to Greg, telling him how much I love him and how much we all need him to fight and get better, because we need him home, his kids need him home, the dogs (Mater especially) need him home.  I told him that there were hundreds and hundreds of people praying for him and that Jesus was sitting right there with him and breathing his life-giving breath into his lungs.  I don't know if he could hear me or not, but I'm praying he did.  As expected, I was a blubbering fool for most of the conversation. 

I spoke to Nurse Martin before church today and Greg was pretty much the same.  The vent is at 55%, which is not too bad.  He didn't really have much more to say.  

Today's picture is from when we hiked through the Dells of the Eau Claire a few years back, well probably about ten years back.   

Greg Covid - Day 11

Kind of a long update because I spoke with hospital staff three times today.  Not because there was anything bad, but I was starting to slip into a bit of depression, and I just needed to be reassured that Greg was OK.

 I spoke with Greg's nurse, Maureen early this morning and she said that Greg had a good night and she didn’t make many changes to anything.  She had to go up a little bit on oxygen, from 50 to 60%.  His breathing didn’t change, but  his oxygen saturation was dropping, so they had to go up.  She was not sure why that happened.  His temp most of the night was between 100 and 100.4.  His sedation had been turned up, but she was able to turn it down and he was doing fine.  She said they may continue to reduce his sedation.   

Just after lunch, I spoke with Greg's nurse, Martin.  He said that Greg was having an OK day.    His vent was up to 70 when he got there, but it's now down to 60, and while we were talking, the respiratory therapist was there, and turned it down to 55%.  The took three cultures today, because Greg is still battling some sort of infection.  He had a central line because of the blood pressure meds, but I never knew that.  The took that central line out today and are just using two regular IVs.   Martin said they took it out just in case there’s an infection in the line.  He called it infection “risk mgmt.”.   Greg had a new chest x-ray taken this morning, and it's still pretty much the same as the last one.   Martin said that Greg is pretty comfortable looking and doesn’t seem to be working too hard to breathe.  Martin had him almost in a sitting-type position today and he seemed comfortable with that, too.  He also shaved him, which I thought was very nice.   

They also did an echocardiogram of his heart today and are looking at the valves to make sure there’s not an infected heart valve.   I don't have those results yet.   

At about 5 p.m., the doctor called me.   She asked me how I was doing, and I said I was doing kind of OK, but seeing as the doctors only call me when there's bad news, I was a bit worried.  She very quickly assured me that there was no bad news and she just wanted to update me on Greg.

Greg is stable.  He is not improving, but he is not getting worse, which is good.  He is not requiring more oxygen which is good.  We want to find the source of infection, which is why he’s on broad spectrum antibiotics.   The vent is on a more supportive mode at night, which means he's breathing more on his own.  They will continue to try to decrease support every day to see how he is doing, so basicaly, they want to wean a little bit more and more each day.   She said it's good news that he’s doing the same as yesterday and that it may take a little longer for him because of his diaphragm.  He has covid pneumonia, which also causes longer periods of intubation.  

I asked the doctor about giving Greg the antibodies of someone who had covid, and she said that they can only try the antibodies if they are not very sick.  Obviously, that's not Greg.  

I also spoke to the doctor about Greg's IVIG treatment.  That's the human immune globulin treatments that I give Greg every week.  It has kept him from getting sick for the last three years.  Immune Globulin comes from people who donate plasma.  Greg's infusions are, very simply, other people's antibodies to help keep him from getting sick because of his compromised immune system.   If Greg has an infection or something like that, wouldn't his IVIG infusions help fight that?  The doctor didn't seem to think so, because covid is a virus, but I'm pretty darn sure that anything that can possibly help boost his immune system can help him fight this horrible virus!  It's part of his normal medications, so he should receive it, just like all his other normal medications.  The doctor is going to speak with the rest of the team and see what they think.  As far as I'm concerned, if they can't provide me with a darn good reason as to why he should not receive his infusion, then he is going to get the infusion, whether they think it will help or not.   

It's now almost midnight and I've spoken to Greg's night nurse Julie.  He is still about the same.  His O2 is at 92%, which is good, and his blood pressure is still good.  So, while he is still the same, this is good news, because he's not getting worse or going backwards. 

Please continue your prayers for Greg!   

For tonight's picture, I'm posting one of the two of us together, kind of!  For years, when Greg would take video, if he walked past a mirror, he'd wave and say "hi."  He began doing that with still pictures too, and if he was looking at his shadow on the ground, he'd wave.  It became a running joke.  In the picture below, I am walking on the beach of the Coral Sea at night in Port Douglas.  It's a fuzzy picture because it's dark out and all he has is his cell phone, but you can clearly see his shadow waving!  Ha, ha!