hello all, updates on dad and me

[Guest guest]

first of all, thank you everyone who sent good wishes for me and

also my dad, i appreciate all teh love, hugs and prayers.

i went into the hosp on memorial day and got out july 7. i was in

for bilateral kidney infections as well as an intestinal

block/twist. i was pretty sick for 3 weeks, i was on so much pain

meds and nauseau meds that i dont remember the first 3 weeks in the

hosp. just as i was to be discharged i ended out getting a minor

staff infection with took me 2 more weeks to get over. i got out

on thurs july 7, however on july 5th at 11pm dad fell hard in the

house, the hospice opted not to come out unitl the next day and the

evealuated dad as 'battered adn bruised but no major issues that

they could note' they stood by this even as the lady who bathed him

compaliined to the nurse that dad wouldnt even get up to take a bath

and normally he would do anything that evie (dad calls her evie even

tho her name is evelyn.) our family doc who was the one who admitted

me didnt feel comfortable with what the hospice nurse said, but i

was not taking all meds orally on wed the6th so i had to take all

oral meds that wed inordre to go home thurs morning, which i did, i

got home at 11 and at 1130 i called the doctors office and then the

ambulance to let him konw that i thought dad was seriously hurt.

got to the same hosp that i was in for 5 weeks and found out that

dad had a fractured hip ball and needed surgery the next day. dad

had the damaged right hip ball removed and a metal one put in

instead that was attacehed to a small rod inserted in to his big

thigh bone. everyone at baptist was eager to read the brochures

that i brought about lbd!!!! dad recouperated for one week and then

was transferred to a rehab facility. dad was in this pelvis brace

with was to keep his hip bone in place and try to restrict teh

movement of his right knee, which is the lbd stiffest knee. we had

to have the brace replaced once as daddy;s muscles are so wanting to

bend at the lbd's demand that he actually bent the metal bars on the

brace.

well after being in rehab less than one week, where i also gave out

tons of brochures inordre to help daddy, but they were aware of lbd

as they have another patient there with it too. well apparently as

they were feeding dad today he threw up his lunch and apparently

aaspirated some food as well. that was 130ish. at 400 donnie (my

husband) and sissy (our caregiver) went to see him today so i could

rest and by 5pm dad was in respiratory distress one of the CNA's an

old biddy of a lady, came in and removed his wheel chair saying

that 'the wheelchair was hindering air movement in dads room and

that all he needed was a fan to help him breahte.' fortunatley sissy

was well versed in resp distres and she ran up the hall and

wscreamed that dad was in severe resp distress, when his nurse came

in she called the ambulance and they came and picked daddy up. my

donnie told them we wished him to be brought to baptist hosp, they

refused saying that dad was too ill to make the 26 min drive so they

took him to west florida hosp which was less than 5 min away.

fortuanly they did or i probalby would have lost dad. i got there

maybe 10- 15 minutes after they got there and i was showed stright

in. dad was sweating profusely and struggling hard to breathe his

color was ashen and he had fear in his eyes with every breath he

tried to take. the doc asked me about dnr and wanted to know if i

wanted a trach tube put in, if i didnt he most certaily would

die. i asked dad if he wanted the trach tube in, he said yes, so i

said yes, he then got fear in his eyes when he saw the equipment i

agaiin asked him, again he said yes, so i told them to go ahead.

they gave him 5mg of varised which sedated hime enough to put the

trach tube ihn with no fight from him and yet he cuold still follow

their instructions to cough. then they put in a central line so

they wouldnt have to poke him so much for blood. then they strgapped

his hands so he wouldnt pull out the tube and the iv. he then

started throwing up thru his nose and mouth again so they had to put

an NG tube in, he had over 700cc of fluid on his tummy. we left him

at 11pm in cardiac intenisve care. they siad he didnt have a

heartattack but that he probalby has pneumoia fromm the aspiration

and/or he had a pulmonary embolysim from being inactive post

surgery. but they were unable to do a ct on him because they

couldnt keep his heart rate, and blood pressure controlled.

donnie is gonna visit him at 6 in the morning i am going to go at 9

hopefully when some of the doctors make their rounds.

also, my aunt's husband hada quad heart bypass and is diabetic and

is having a extremely hard time in getting recovreed, he has sore

devereloped on his feet and is unable to walk at all, until he does

he cannot return home as my aunt cannot get him up and down by

herself. she also helps my 98 year old greandmohter who still lives

in a condo by herslef but very close to one of my cousins and her

hubby. well my greandmother went into the hosp in staten island ny

for gall stones and pneymonia iwth one of hte stones being stuckk in

her bile ducts. she was placed on a ct scanner and for some reason

she was left unattended whil e on the table and somehow she managed

to fall off the table, and fractrued her collar bone, injured

without any seen fractures her knee and has stitches in her head. so

she has a longer hosp stay because of their negligence. sigh, i am

so ready for 2006, well at least hurricane dennis missed us, thank

God!!!

welcome to all the newbies, just a short info about me, my dad is

70 and has prob had lbd for over 10 years, he startred out with

unexplained falls and hallucinations and visual distortions. in may

2004 he was hospitalzed with complete confusion and the parkinson

shakes. that was when lbd was mentioned to me, and after

researdching it, i felt dad has it and we tried exelon and namenda

dad had great relief on exelon for the first 8 months to a year and

then wehn the effedts werent continuing we added namenda, but then

for some reason dad had orthostatic blood pressure drops, which

means whenever he went from laying to sitting to standing and to

waolking his blood pressure would drop and he would go weak and

fiant and/or fall. so he was taken off those too and had fludrocort

added and since then his bp has been much more stable. until this

episode at the hosp. daddy, my husband donnie, and our caregiverd

and myslef all live in daddys house in pensacola florida, we were

hit by ivan the terrible last year and lost our fences and gained

some pine trees that werent ours, and lost our florida room. but

fortunatly hurricane dennis missed us, we just had some more limbs

in our yard, thats it, so this time we were blessed.

again welcome to all the newbies, hello to all of the regs and to

all of the background folks too. i hope all is well, and i am sorry

that the newbies had to find this group, but i can tell you from

personal experience that this is the best group of people to have

around,

thanks again to all for the emails of good wishes and to those who

called as well. i love all of you!!! hugs sharon m pensacola,

florida