{"id":1162,"date":"2013-10-24T22:39:37","date_gmt":"2013-10-25T05:39:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.angieandjim.com\/blog\/?p=1162"},"modified":"2013-10-24T23:21:41","modified_gmt":"2013-10-25T06:21:41","slug":"a-long-expected-visit-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.angieandjim.com\/blog\/2013\/10\/24\/a-long-expected-visit-2\/","title":{"rendered":"A Long-Expected Visit"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Last year when we were in the hospital, I noticed an interesting sign<\/a> posted in the hallway as I was leaving Angie’s room.\u00a0 I snapped a photo on my phone and we talked about it later.\u00a0 Apparently, Stanford has a group of volunteers that bring their dogs to help patients heal.\u00a0 Well, she asked about it and requested a visit.\u00a0 We were told they would stop by sometime today.\u00a0 Angie was really excited and was rather anxious all day while we waited.<\/p>\n

Max, the Labradoodle, came to visit us this afternoon at about 4.\u00a0 A team of about 4 very kind women came in and chatted with us for a bit.\u00a0 Max is fairly new at his job and is still in training with his owner.\u00a0 He was very kind and did very well.\u00a0 He is 7 years old and has been doing visits for about 6 months.\u00a0 They are a service called PAWS, which is an acronym for Patient Assisted Wellness @ Stanford.\u00a0 They even gave us a little card with Max’s picture and information on the back.<\/p>\n

I knew it would cheer up Angie, but I was actually surprised by how much it lifted her spirits.\u00a0 There is really something very special about animals and their healing influence.<\/p>\n

Today was a lot better than yesterday.\u00a0 I’m sorry I didn’t post until now, I’m running very low on sick leave, so I had to spend more time working than I have previously.\u00a0 Between attending Angie and trying to keep up with things in Livermore, my day was pretty full.\u00a0 That and no procedures to give me some time to post.\u00a0 Anyway, enough about me…<\/p>\n

Pain was in control all day and her vitals have looked great all day.\u00a0 Her O2 saturation levels have been in the 90s most of the day (94 as of right now<\/em>), which is fabulous.\u00a0 Of course, she’s on 6 L of oxygen, so we’re not back to normal yet.\u00a0 But, the bottom line is that her breathing is good and she’s feeling well.\u00a0 She even muscled through a wall all the way down the hallway.\u00a0 (That was right after a dose of morphine, so she was extra brave.)<\/p>\n

This afternoon, they wanted to turn on the suction for her chest tube again, as per doctor’s orders.\u00a0 Last time she got up to -10 mmH2O, but it was causing extreme discomfort and severe pain, so they turned it off.\u00a0 They wanted to give her some pain meds and ease it up to -20 mmH2O, which is where she is now.\u00a0 We’ve got a plan to keep her medicated through the night with the scheduling of the different things she can have, so I think we’re set.<\/p>\n

This afternoon a medical student training to be a doctor came and asked Angie a bunch of questions.\u00a0 It is part of a program where they have students come and talk to patients to see if they ask the right questions to try and diagnose the problem they came into the hospital for.\u00a0 They asked us to pretend it was Monday and answer questions as if he were the doctor we saw a few days ago.\u00a0 After that, he asked for a complete medical history.\u00a0 I’m not sure he knew what he was asking for!\u00a0 We proceeded to recount, with as few back-tracks as possible, a chronological list of all of the surgeries and procedures over her lifetime and especially in the last 6-8 years.\u00a0 He seemed genuinely interested (he even admitted he’d like to become a heart surgeon, I think) and had very good bedside manor.\u00a0 I’m sure he’ll be a great doctor.\u00a0 One funny thing did happen: while he was doing his examination, he wanted to check Angie’s eyes.\u00a0 He didn’t have a flashlight on him, so he pulled out his phone to use the camera flash as a flashlight and then sheepishly looked up at the man who was observing his interview and asked, “This probably isn’t appropriate, is it?”\u00a0 “No, it isn’t appropriate at all.”\u00a0 Whoops.\u00a0 He went on to say, “Some older patients think you are taking their picture because they don’t realize you can use it as just a flashlight.”\u00a0 Yeah, I can see why that’d be bad.\u00a0 Poor guy; besides that, he did a fantastic job.<\/p>\n

Jon came by a few hours ago to drop off a couple things and to chat for a minute.\u00a0 As we were explaining the current state of things he asked, “So, what does it feel like to have the fluid sucked out of you?”\u00a0 Angie retorted, “Draining, literally.”\u00a0 We all cracked a wry smile at her humor.\u00a0 It was good to see Jon and visit for a bit.<\/p>\n

Tomorrow we’ve got a CT scan planned to look at Angie’s liver to make sure it is still functioning properly.\u00a0 I’ll let you know how that goes.<\/p>\n

Well, I think that just about covers events for the day.\u00a0 Sorry for the wait.\u00a0 I hope you find it was worth it \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n