TRACEY UPDATE - END OF DAY on MONDAY

Well, physically, tracey is doing much better with one minor exception.  She can't stand up without spiking her heartrate to 140... it's bad enough its averaging 100 bpm when it should be down around 60 or 70 or maybe 80.  That's probably the asthma meds, but mom suggested we ask the doctor about that tomorrow.   And even when she can stand up, she's only got one foot she can use.   We got the doc to give her permission to go off the heart monitor so we could get her out into the lounge.   So we took her out in the wheel chair tonight to visit with Em, Jer, Donna, Ernie, Mike & Lauren and my mom and after just 30 minutes, her foot had swollen back up, and we'd had it elevated the whole time.   Her leg and foot were actually starting to get down to a reasonable size (still swollen, but not as bad), but now it's back up as big as it was when we first came in.  and now the real kicker... one of her Docs today came in and suggested that she might be able to go home tomorrow.  yeah right.  I don't think she's ready for that yet.   Not till she has a little mobility of her own, shes on pills only and no injections, and her numbers level out.   Not only that, we haven't done any follow up cat scans or ultra sounds to check her two clot locations to verify that this thing has started to disolve.

Here are today's numbers....  Remember we want PTT between 60 and 80 and INR at 2.5 - 3.0.

7 am Blood draw showed
    -- ptt 86  (Up from 73 yesterday)
    -- inr 3.4 (up from 2.9 yesterday after which they only gave her 2mg of warfarin / coumadin)
    -- so they dropped her Heprin to 12ml/hr down from 14 which is what they dropped it down to from 16 the last time she peaked over 80.

So the doc decided that sometimes, Heprin warps the INR number, so to be more accurate, lets take two tubes instead of one, and we'll do a process to extract the Heprin out of the blood first, and then we'll test the PTT.   Gee, Hum... if the Heprin throws the PTT off... (sarcastic movie actor yelling voice, like Adam Sandler in Wedding Singer when he said "Once again, Information that would have been use-ful to me yesterday!!").  THEN WHY IN THE WORLD WEREN"T WE DOING THE MORE EXACT TEST ALL ALONG.

So they redid the blood work at 3pm
    -- the PTT is now down to 66 because they cut her Heprin at 9am when they got the first tests back.
    -- the INR is now 3.9.   We overshot our mark... and we overshot it by a LOT!  This showed when the nurse took the needle out of tracey's arm, taped on the gause, and tracey soaked it with blood before the bleeding stopped.   That's never happened before.
    -- At 5:30, the nurse shut off tracey's Heprin all together.
    -- She got NO warfarin / coumadin tonight.
They'll redo the bloodwork in the AM and decide what to do from there to try to stabilize her chemistry out and get it where we want it.

The nurse came in and wanted to remove tracey's IV and do a new one since it'd been three days since they put it in... Tracey asked her to move it somewhere else in her left arm, as she is right handed, and has really enjoyed having the use her her right hand back again.   That was the arm the first IV was put into.  And it needed to be moved as her skin was turning red under the tape.   Her body doesn't like the tape they use on her.    The nurse had a hard time finding vein's she liked, as tracey has small vessels... and then she saw one in tracey's left arm the size of the nile river, but tracey stuck to her guns and made her find one in her left arm.   She had to pay the price to get it there, as the nurse took 4 angles to find the sucker, but she got in, and tracey was glad to still have her right hand.   I can't watch my own blood work being done, but I don't mind watching her's so much... however, after the 3rd stab, my right foot started sliding back and forth across the floor as I got the willies.

We did get to see two of her three docs today... Her admitting doctor, possiby and internalist... and also her Pulminary doctor who flipped out on the nurses for starting the Chinese Fire Drill on Friday Night.   The Pulminary Doctor wants to keep her a few more days.  The admitting doctor said she might be able to leave tomorrow.   We have the list of reasons why should stay a few more days ready for both of them.  

Our neighbor of 13 heart atacks checked out this morning... and we got a new friend, an eldarly woman who can't talk much for the 02 mask, who just got out of the cath-lab where she got 5 stints installed.   (Installed really sounds like the wrong word).   Her family was in the same state of mind that I was in on Friday.   She was hurting something bad when they brough her into the room.   I had to get ear plugs for tracey so she could finish her nap, which sounds kind of rude, but what do you do?   I asked descretely and tried to be upbeat with the family.  So pray for all them too.  I think her name is Janet or Janice... her adult kids were pretty shaken up....

The big prayer request for tonight is that they don't try to rush us outta here.  I don't care if they move tracey up to a less critical area... (however we like the fact that the nurses here seem more up to speed on the prcedures for clots and we've got 2/3's of the trained and working for us...  and the other 3rd just don't seem to like nursing.)   So we're not looking forward to training a 3nd batch of folks in the cope methods of medicine, but if it lets us hang out until tracey really has some independance back, then so be it.   I really don't want to take her home until we know they have this thing nailed... and they prove it with before and afters... especailly with the family history here.

So pray they don't try to fast track her home.   We want to see this through here, until she's really ready.   No need to rush things.  

So neat praises for today... beyond her numbers going up and stuff and being able to get outta bed... We got an amazing photo from Kenya today that is threatening to become my new desktop background... some great guests.... she got of her room and into the lounge (they said the wireless monitor wouldn't reach... but it did) ... an awesome testimony of God's healing from someone else who had major clot issues, who heard of tracey's condition vicariously through a prayer list, two cute e-cards, a forward, a baby photo, and some well wishes.  Please keep it coming.   We living on your emails right now :-)

I loved this line from someone's reply... <<and Tracey we wish for the best, but I gotta say that I was crying & laughing at Drew's updates....I know it is second nature to him to be so detailed....but it extremely humorous to the rest of us that don't share that level of detailed-ness!  Anyway, I'm sure the hospital staff is just loving you so much! >>

More to come tomorrow, I'm sure.


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-- Drew & Tracey --
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1Thes 2:6-12 We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us.

-- Good things come to those who wait --
Jacob served seven years for Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her. - Gen 29:20

www.DrewandTracey.com
www.GZYouth.com
www.GZMConline.com
www.ProjectRake.com
www.NLPCFamily.com

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