Post by Robin Hood on May 19, 2013 22:24:56 GMT -6
Some of you know Becky, some of you don't, but I will share with you guy what all has went down the last week.
Becky went into the hospital last Sunday to start getting her weened off of Coumadin and switched over to a blood thinner with a shorter half life as she was scheduled for a complete hysterectomy on Wednesday morning. Becky has what is called Factor V Leiden with a history of deep vein thrombosis (blood clots). Every thing was going great, blood thinners switched over correctly and she was good to go for surgery. They took her back and done the procedure, sent her up to her room at the hospital for recovery, she was supposed to go home on Friday. Here is where shit went south, early Thursday morning she started to crash, her blood pressure dropped and she was having issues breathing. They done an emergency CAT scan and found she had a large amount of blood pooling in her abdomen where her uterus was. They rushed her straight back into surgery, they found a fairly large bleed that the doctor thinks must have clotted during surgery and then let go after he had closed her back up. Becky had lost over 2.5 liters of blood, for those of you who don't know, the human body only contains between 4.5 and 5 liters, so she lost approximately half of her blood volume. The rushed 4 units of whole blood and 2 units of plasma into her, she stabilized, but still was touch and go. They ended up giving her 2 more units of blood and 2 more units of plasma in the ICU on Friday morning. Friday evening she was finally starting to stabilize but by this time between the blood loss, the lack of O2 and just the general trauma of it all she had started to develop quite a few secondary issues, the most concerning was the fluid building up around her heart and lungs. They started giving her diuretics to get her kidneys into overdrive and start pulling some of the fluid off, thankfully she responded well to these. By yesterday evening she was starting to come back around to the living, her color had started to come back and she was actually awake and feeling better. They moved her out of the ICU and back to a regular room, she is still in the hospital and probably will be till towards the end of the week, she is steadily improving and feeling better and better, she has now been up and out of bed and is starting to actually recover from the surgery itself. She still needs her O2 for now and is still getting quite a few goodies through her IV. They are hoping to get her off the O2 possibly tomorrow if she can get her lung function back up so that her O2 levels stay steady. They talked about trying to get her off the IV's the day after tomorrow when she finishes with her IV antibiotics, which they decided to give her as a precaution since they had to do two surgeries. There are a couple of concerning facts as of right now, her kidney function is still pretty low, it is improving with each test, but is still not up to snuff for someone her age. They think she may have suffered some kidney damage from lack of blood flow, hopefully it is temporary and will return after some time to heal. The other concerning thing right now is her hemoglobin hasn't stabilized fully, but they think that could be coming simply because her body is still trying to "catch up" if you will, between all the fluids and the whole blood and plasma having to get all balanced back out it could take a few more days.
So, with all that said, I have two requests for my friends here, the first is easy, please pray for Becky's fast return to full health. The second, actually requires something, please go to your local blood bank and donate. The simple gift of blood saved my wife's life and I will be forever grateful. After things go back to some normalcy around here I am going to find out if I can donate, at one time I was told no since I had had Hepatitis when I was little, but with ch-ch-changes to technology and medicine over the last 20 odd years since I was told that, things may have changed. If I am able to donate, I will become a regular donor since I am a universal donor.
Becky went into the hospital last Sunday to start getting her weened off of Coumadin and switched over to a blood thinner with a shorter half life as she was scheduled for a complete hysterectomy on Wednesday morning. Becky has what is called Factor V Leiden with a history of deep vein thrombosis (blood clots). Every thing was going great, blood thinners switched over correctly and she was good to go for surgery. They took her back and done the procedure, sent her up to her room at the hospital for recovery, she was supposed to go home on Friday. Here is where shit went south, early Thursday morning she started to crash, her blood pressure dropped and she was having issues breathing. They done an emergency CAT scan and found she had a large amount of blood pooling in her abdomen where her uterus was. They rushed her straight back into surgery, they found a fairly large bleed that the doctor thinks must have clotted during surgery and then let go after he had closed her back up. Becky had lost over 2.5 liters of blood, for those of you who don't know, the human body only contains between 4.5 and 5 liters, so she lost approximately half of her blood volume. The rushed 4 units of whole blood and 2 units of plasma into her, she stabilized, but still was touch and go. They ended up giving her 2 more units of blood and 2 more units of plasma in the ICU on Friday morning. Friday evening she was finally starting to stabilize but by this time between the blood loss, the lack of O2 and just the general trauma of it all she had started to develop quite a few secondary issues, the most concerning was the fluid building up around her heart and lungs. They started giving her diuretics to get her kidneys into overdrive and start pulling some of the fluid off, thankfully she responded well to these. By yesterday evening she was starting to come back around to the living, her color had started to come back and she was actually awake and feeling better. They moved her out of the ICU and back to a regular room, she is still in the hospital and probably will be till towards the end of the week, she is steadily improving and feeling better and better, she has now been up and out of bed and is starting to actually recover from the surgery itself. She still needs her O2 for now and is still getting quite a few goodies through her IV. They are hoping to get her off the O2 possibly tomorrow if she can get her lung function back up so that her O2 levels stay steady. They talked about trying to get her off the IV's the day after tomorrow when she finishes with her IV antibiotics, which they decided to give her as a precaution since they had to do two surgeries. There are a couple of concerning facts as of right now, her kidney function is still pretty low, it is improving with each test, but is still not up to snuff for someone her age. They think she may have suffered some kidney damage from lack of blood flow, hopefully it is temporary and will return after some time to heal. The other concerning thing right now is her hemoglobin hasn't stabilized fully, but they think that could be coming simply because her body is still trying to "catch up" if you will, between all the fluids and the whole blood and plasma having to get all balanced back out it could take a few more days.
So, with all that said, I have two requests for my friends here, the first is easy, please pray for Becky's fast return to full health. The second, actually requires something, please go to your local blood bank and donate. The simple gift of blood saved my wife's life and I will be forever grateful. After things go back to some normalcy around here I am going to find out if I can donate, at one time I was told no since I had had Hepatitis when I was little, but with ch-ch-changes to technology and medicine over the last 20 odd years since I was told that, things may have changed. If I am able to donate, I will become a regular donor since I am a universal donor.
