July 23, 2003
Dear Friends,
For the past five days I have been fighting my way through a valley of delirium, depression, nausea, diarrhea, extremely high fevers, drug reactions and lots of mind altering drugs. Last two days were the worst, doctors would talk to me and have to wake me up every few words. The nutritionist kept asking me impossible questions, like what do I want to drink. I don't know! She didn't seem too pleased with that answer. Yesterday I showed symptoms of acute renal failure. The good news is that renal failure can be treated with dialysis. The bad news is that the dialysis may be required for life.
Early this morning, the little thunderstorm that was hanging over my bed started to dissipate. The fevers broke to low levels. My strength was returning. Through the day my shortness of breath and painful breathing subsided. I actually had a chance to visit with my relatives. Too bad my Mom and Dad had already left. Lab results today still did not show normal renal function, however the doctors are becoming more optimistic that it may be reversing itself because of my general improvement compared to the last 2 days. As you might expect, I am eagerly waiting tomorrow's lab results.
On the medical front, I have no idea what they are giving me now. I lost track of all my medications, I've been eating a lot of Tylenol. My Heparin levels went way above the desired range and so did the INR from the Coumadin. For the moment I am off Coumadin completely and my Heparin dose has been trimmed way back. These are probably symptoms of renal failure, partially anyway. On the good news side of things, the blood clots in my right arm and neck appear to have dissipated. They don't really want to put in a dialysis catheter as long as my blood clotting level are so incredibly low. They are hoping I just recover. Another item of interest is that my platelet levels seems to be rising rapidly.
Lab Results |
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Blood Cell Type |
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|
|
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| WBC | 4.5 | .2 | nr | .2 |
| RBC | 4.30 | 2.69 | nr | 2.69 |
| HGB | 13.9 | 8.4 | nr | 8.2 |
| PLT | 130 | 87 | nr | 197 |
Till next time.
Ted
tw@wilcoxent.com