The tentative plan is for her to leave the hospital tomorrow and finish recovering at home. Sounds like the final decision will be made Monday sometime. John is making the arrangements for a bed and nursing help at home.

When I arrived in the late afternoon, Karen was sitting in her recliner and soon was playing Scattergories with Steph and Jessica. (Karen was WAY too leniant on allowing some of Jessica’s answers!) Her mind was still a little foggy (probably from residual meds in her system) but she got clearer as the evening progressed. She is still very weak and had a little difficulty handling the paper and pencil but was able to get it done. A little later she was eating jello, drinking chicken broth, and when I left she had just ordered grilled fish, potatoes, and cooked carrots (I’m not sure how much of it she ate though). Sleep is rare in ICU and she is definitely sleep deprived. I am hopeful that she gets a good night’s sleep tonight.

If she continues as she is, the nurse guessed that Karen will be in ICU for another day or two, then move to a floor where they’ll help her continue to regain her strength. At best, she might be out of the hospital in a week or so. Complications can crop up at anytime though so please continue to pray.

They’re also doing a procedure right now (in radiology) to drain about a liter of fluid from her right lung.  She is given a local anesthetic then a needle is inserted to draw the fluid off. Hopefully this helps the pneumonia and eases her breathing. They’re also giving blood thinners to help dissolve the clots.

One other concern: Karen’s blood pressure continues to rise. So far, the drugs they have given her did not bring it down, so this is a specific matter for prayer (in addition to the other concerns).

Karen breathed on her own for almost two hours this evening. Steph was holding her hand and said “Mom, can you squeeze my hand?” She did, and after that she tried to snap her fingers.

Because Karen is so thirsty, they give her a wet sponge to put in her mouth. When she had the last one in, Mel said ‘last one Mom!’ Karen shook her head no, then refused to give it up.

We’re getting there!

Her liver is still quite enlarged though. We saw it on the x-ray – it intrudes into almost 1/2 of her right lung space, and this is causing a major breathing problem. She simply can’t move her lungs enough to take normal breaths so when she’s off the ventilator she’s breathing very shallow and fast (like hyperventilating). This does not allow the body to take in oxygen and get rid of carbon dioxide very well and over time that can cause all sorts of problems. So they’re leaving her on the vent so her body can continue to heal. They’ll do another trial to see how she breathes on her own on Monday or Tuesday. Frankly, it appears to be several more days before she’s ready to get off the ventilator.

On a separate note, as Jeff and Mel mentioned, Karen has been waking up from time to time. They have reduced the sedative dose somewhat and that gives her some waking moments. She’s still pretty out of it, and it’s virtually impossible to communicate much. Her arms are so weak she could not write to us, but it was good to see her eyes open and her nodding her head and stuff.

Karen remains in ICU on the ventilator. They say she is still not strong enough to breathe very well on her own and that she needs the strength to repair her liver and kidneys, so they’re leaving her on the vent to give her body time to repair the other things. Yesterday I heard that it’d be several more days at least on the ventilator.

Blood clots are a significant concern. In addition to the clots in her arm, shoulder, etc, there are now clots in her legs. They are going to try to do a procedure (possible today) to address this issue.

Her kidneys remain at approx. the same level they have been. They are not getting worse or better.

Yesterday was a bit of a depressing day. We all want Karen to be home so it’s hard to be without her and to wait for her to improve. Keeping up with what’s going on medically and even trying to get clear answers is very difficult, as there’s many people involved in her care and they seem to only be around for a few days before there’s a new nurse / doctor / whatever that you have to talk to.

Perhaps someone else can post with a few more details, but I wanted to give everybody at least an idea of where we stand.

I had hoped that the trial would have gone better, but we’ll have to wait until tomorrow.

We’ve created logins for a few other people to post to this website, so make sure you check the tagline of the post so you know who is writing.

Blood pressure readings are higher (128/60) but that might be because they’re taking blood pressure from a cuff rather than the more direct way they were doing it earlier. Hemoglobin is down to 9.4. The doctors are not concerned about this. Perhaps they should be.

Kidneys are still producing urine just fine though creatinine levels are slightly higher. The nurse was not concerned about this. The kidney doctors (seems like there’s a specialty doctor for everything) hadn’t seen Karen today when I was there so I don’t know much more about the kidneys.

Overall the nurse said that Karen was on a slow trend upward and that, if things continued, she might be out of the ICU this week. Of course this could all change at any moment, but that’s where we stand now. There are still a myriad of possible concerns that could change that.

Once Karen is removed from the ventilator, she will likely spend one more night in the ICU then be transferred to a floor where there’s less care that the ICU but more than a regular hospital room. It will be good to be able to talk to Karen again.

There are blood clots in Karen’s arm, shoulder, and towards her heart. These are a result of the IV. Fortunately they are venous (as opposed to arterial) but also, unwelcome.

The IV that they had in her foot is no longer working so we no longer have real-time blood pressure monitoring. They switched back to a more traditional BP cuff every 30 minutes.

Her temp has gone from 100.2 to 98.6 via Tylenol.

As of this morning, Karen’s kidney function was not normal. Though she is producing urine, her creatinine level is elevated. It should be 1.0 but it’s plateaued at 3.0. It’s good that it’s not rising any more but we need it to fall.

The longer Karen is on a ventilator and in the condition she’s in, the more complications will arise simply because of the care they are providing. This is a difficult situation to be in.