Some Better

Andrea had a fairly full and good day today.  When we got there this morning she was still asleep from a tiny dose of propafol and a mild sleep aid.  She was awake most of the day except for a nap around 6 PM for awhile.  Physio therapy were in this afternoon and gave her a very extensive workout to strengthen her arms and try to limber up her shoulders, as she has stiffened up somewhat.  Later on they had her sitting up on the edge of the bed for 7 minutes.  She was very weak and wobbly but she wanted to do it quite badly.  They also disconnected her trach ventilation for 2 hours this afternoon to help her rib cage muscles strengthen and help her breathe.  She will have to be able to handle 48 hours on her own breathing without the machine before they are able to remove the trache.  Although she was very tired tonight, she handled her workout, sitting up, breathing on her own, etc., quite well.  During the night last night they were able to stop all her blood pressure support medications and she was able to maintain good pressure on her own.  Unfortunately during the day her blood pressure dipped and they restarted her on one of them again, tonight's nurse said it was likely because of the dialysis machine drying her out a little too much, hopefully it will correct itself soon, it had improved alot by the time I left.  They had increased her tube feeds today also, they want to get her off TPN, her intravenous nutrition as it is hard on her liver on a long term basis.  I forgot to ask what her bilirubin was this afternoon, this morning's was the same as last night's.  There is a very good intensivist doctor in charge of her and today he said he was not so concerned about her bilirubin, to him the biggest indicator was how she was feeling, he felt that as she continued to improve her liver wuld look after itself.  She is clearly not out of the woods yet, but she is making some small steps toward recovery. Time to get some sleep, hope to report again tomorrow night.

 

Thanks, Maynard