Tue 2/27/2007 7:58 AMGood Morning Y'all, Just wanted to give you the scoop on how things are going. Dad is ok. Can't say great, but just ok. He is doing well with the feeding tube and is not trying to pull it out. That was one of our big concerns. He is tolerating the feedings just fine. We just have to be so careful on the amount of liquids that he gets because it will then get the congestive heart failure. The doctor has limited him to 1400cc's of fluid a day including the formula. The formula is a product called Diabetasource, not sure if I spelled that one correctly. It is about 250 calories and is 250 cc's of liquid. It is the diabetic equivalent of Ensure or Boost. So he gets 4 cans of that a day along with 100 cc of water to clear the line and to give his pills. He really should be getting 6 cans a day, but we did that the first week and that is why he ended up back in the hospital on the 16th. The cardiologist has really cut back on his meds and we have to take his blood pressure before we give his meds. If the blood pressure is 110 or less (for the top number) we don't give the meds. If it is above, we give. So far last week he only got about 3 of the 15 pills. The doctor says that since he doesn't get much fluids, his body keeps the meds hanging around. The other thing that is going on is that he is having Apnea episodes (that is when you stop breathing for periods of time). On Sunday, Anna and I were with Dad and I noticed that he was breathing very fast. That could be clue that he needs more of his lasix because of the water around the heart. So I asked Anna what his respirations were when she took them at 5pm. She said about 25 per minute (normal folks have around 15 or so a minute). So I said lets do it again. Well, we were trying to count his breaths and all we saw were his heart beats moving his shirt. Then he started breathing fast. These episodes are lasting as long as 45 seconds. Talk about scaring you. You just don't know if he will start back up again. But so far he has. He hasn't been awake much since he came home from the hospital last Monday. Yesterday, he was awake more than he has been for the past week, but he is still pretty sleepy. I looked up apnea in the elderly on the web and they say that if they get the apnea they are oftentimes sleepy in the day. Dr.D. said that he may have had another stroke one that is deep in the brain stem, because that is where the breathing center of the brain is located. They have done a bunch of catscans of the brain and haven't seen any new signs of stroke, but she says that the catscan can't take a good picture of that area of the brain. You really need a MRI, but he can't have one of those because of the pacemaker. I am not sure if I told y'all, but during the hospitalization from Feb 2, we noticed that his right eye is not looking straight ahead anymore. The doctor suspected a stroke, but couldn't see one on the catscan. I think he had one. Dr. D also gave us the ok to get him out of bed some now. When they relased him from the hospital they told us bed rest only, so we kept him there. Now he can get out for short periods of time. Well, that is the update for today. Not too good, but not too bad. Just taking it one day at a time.Love and hugs to all of you, Mary
Posted by Mary on February 27, 2007 at 8:58 AM under
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