Solitude: Two Weeks in a Kaiser Hospital

My ordeal began Late in the afternoon on Friday September 2nd. That morning I attended a workshop at Alvina and felt fine and from there I went to Hanford to meet with four students before picking up Christian at football practice. The moment I walked into the Hanford office the pain began. As I knew from experience I was having trouble with my Gallbladder which in the past has led to Pancreatitis for me because Gallstones can get stuck in the Pancreatic duct. Sometimes these Gallstone attacks last as little as 30 minutes and sometimes they have been known to go on for hours on end, this particular episode started at 3:30 PM. I somehow acted as I was in no pain long enough to meet with my four students and then I drove to Lemoore to pick up Christian, on the way back from Lemoore the pain had still not subsided so I drove myself to the Kaiser Emergency Room where I arrived at 7:30 PM.

Of course with my luck Friday night at a Kaiser Emergency Room is worse than trying to get a table at The Olive Garden. I was hoping at one point that they had those little pagers like restauants do so that I could go outside and get some fresh air since when you are having abdominal pain the last thing you want to do is sit still for extended periods of time. Jamie brought Austin and Madison down and they joined me for a while but as the night dragged on and it seemed like I was nowhere near being called in I had her take the children home so that they could go to bed and I waited on my own. At one point around 11:00 PM I asked if I could at least be given something for the pain if I wasn't going to be called in anytime soon and so I was given something. When the triage nurse called me in to give me the pain medication he said so you've been waiting for almost 3 Hours, I laughed, because at this point it had been closer to 4 hours but then I learned that they don't actually start the clock when you walk into an ER like we do, they wait until you are seen by the triage nurse before starting the clock, that way they can lie to themselves about how long it actually takes them to see patients in the ER. Finally, close to midnight I was called in and given a bed, the nurse drew labs and gave me some pain medication which put me to sleep. Hours later, what time I can not be sure of a doctor finally came in to see me. Apparently, there was only one doctor working the floor and he seemed to be an intern at that, I watched him on multiple occasions go into another room and confer with an attending. Around 5 AM I was moved from the room I was in into another room within the ER because they had a patient coming in by ambulance that they needed to monitor and all the monitor equipment was in my room. About 7 AM Jamie came back to the hospital and joined me in the ER. I was given a huge bottle of disgusting stuff to drink and told I was going to have a CT Scan and then they would wait for a GI consult. Well after all that was completed I found myself taken to a room where a mouthpiece was placed in my mouth to hold my mouth open and I was put to sleep. I don't remember anything else from that weekend or much from Monday either as I spent the time asleep. I can remember waking up briefly and seeing various people visiting but I can't remember any conversations I had during the time.

On Tuesday as I finally started to come through and spent more time awake I learned that they were shooting for Thursday to remove my Gallbladder. As Thursday came and went the still did not perform surgery due to my pancreas still being inflamed. I think it was Wednesday, that they finally approved of me having a clear liquid diet, which I had on Wednesday and Thursday. On Friday they moved me up to a liquid diet but that only lasted for breakfast and lunch, by dinner they switched me back to NPO due to running fevers. At this point I still had not had my surgery that was originally scheduled for Thursday but they finally gave the approval on Saturday for me to have the surgery to have my Gallbladder removed. Prior to surgery I was informed that I would be able to go home either Sunday or Monday. After awakening from surgery the time frame changed to 2 to 5 days due to what appeared to be a growth on my pancreas, this really depressed me because I was looking forward to being able to go home after spending a week in the hospital. On my second Monday in the hospital I had another CT Scan which revealed that there was no growth on my pancreas but that my pancreas was still enlarged. So the NPO would continue. Finally Monday evening I recieved some good news, if my infection continued to go away and I did not run any more fevers they would send me home on Wednesday. However, the catch, I would be on Home Health Care for anywhere from 1 - 3 weeks possibly even more and in 15% of cases like mine a cyst forms on the pancreas that later has to be drained by needle. So on Tuesday I had what they call a PICC line, which is a semipermanent IV placed in my arm whihc would be used to administer my antibiotics as well as my TPN which is bagged nutrients for the coming weeks. Wednesday came and I finally was discharged from the hospital.

My stay in the hospital was certainly not without its own drama:

• I had three doctors caring for me, and I doubt they talked very often because they would each come in every day and tell you different things making for a very confusing time in the hospital. Why the GI did not take the lead and my primary care physician took secondary is beyond me since this would be the GI's area of expertise.
• Next was the nurse that on two occasions broke down and had fits in front of either my family or myself. I asked here one day about something the Dr. Said and she basically got upset and said "We don't know anything, the doctors don't share things with us."
• After surgery they had some orange leg contraptions that pumped up your legs back and forth to prevent the risk of clotting I guess. Well during the day when I would get up and walk they would take them off and then put them back on at night. Well one morning I had a nurse come in and tell me that they had been but on the wrong legs by the nurse the night before, which honestly doesn't surprise me considering I had to call the nurse back after she put them on me because she forgot to turn them on as she left my room.
• I was a very difficult stick for the nurses to start an IV. At one point I was stuck five times before they finally got the IV started on the sixth effort. Another time a nurse came in to start an IV and brought the blood draw caddy by accident, so she had to go back and get the IV caddy, upon returning to my room they attempted twice to start the IV and after failing walked out saying she would have someone else come in, leaving both caddies behind, six hours later someone finally came back in and yes the caddies stayed there the entire time.
• I called for my nurse to come in because I lost an IV when my vein collapsed and instead my nurse I ended up with the blood pressure lady who didn't speak very clear english, she took my vitals and then left turning off the nurse light in the process. Finally after some time later I called for my nurse again and she finally came in unaware that I had called earlier. She looked at my IV and said you should have called earlier, I told her I did and explained the situation and she looked at me and says, "Sometimes we have a language barrier around here."
• When I got home from the Hospital and Saint Agnes brought out supplies for my home treatment they did not bring the Antibiotic I was supposed to be on. Somehow this was missed at Kaiser and never ordered.

I know this isn't everything that happened but it is the stuff that is clearest on my mind at the time. On Wednesday the 14th I was finally discharged, but I was discharged from Kaiser to Home Health Care. Home Health Care was suppposed to come out at 5 PM that night. After talking to the nurse she told me she would be out at 7 PM. Finally, at about 9:45 PM the nurse finally arrived. I was already nervous about the situation but as she had to look at all of the supplies closely to figure out what was going on I became even more nervous. I guess when you have a nurse come into your home you expect them to know exactly what is going on. Come to find out that Home Health Care means they teach you how to push your own IV's and then they come out for blood draws and dressing changes only. The first night I had a bad reaction to the antibiotic and became very clammy and drowsy. Once it was done I immediately started feeling better. So starting on day two I had to have Benadryl injected prior to the antibiotic infusion. Home Health Care came out for 4 days and then the task of connecting IV's became my poor wifes who not only now had to care for our two small children but also had to play nurse to her husband. One of the things we learned during the process is that the main difference between an LVN and an RN is about twice the salary and that an RN is allowed to push IV's while an LVN is not. Ironic isn't it that an RN spends years in school to be able to push IV's yet people are trained in four days to push their own IV's. It makes you wonder where the responsibility falls in cases where people have accidents while trying to start their own IV's.

Well I finished my last antibiotic last night and today I return to see the GI at Kaiser at 4 PM. I am hoping that my lab draws from yesterday all look good and I can have my IV removed but I don't know whether that is even part of the plan today. My diet that began on Saturday of Jello, Chicken Broth, Water and 7Up is kind of getting old so I am hoping that will change. I may have to do another week on the IV since I know when they originally ordered it, it was for two weeks. I am happy that I think the Benadryl and Antibiotic treatment should be complete. As my energy level starts to return I hope that I am soon able to return to work as I feel I am falling behind with things that need to be done, I have never been medically held out of work for any length of time like this before. In fact prior to this I had never been hospitalized except when I was two years old and had tubes placed in my ears. To this day I still even have my tonsils.

I feel sorry for the poor boys who were scheduled to have their birthday party the weekend I was admitted to the hospital, but Austin has been a very good sport about the ordeal. He is just happy to have daddy back home with his family. I am upset about Christian though because through the entire ordeal I never heard from him until my mom called his mother and told her I was still in the hospital and it would be nice if they called. He called but really didn't have much to say, then his mother said she would keep him and travel with him to his football game that coming weekend, I sure hoped she would since there was no way I would be able to do so. The ironic thing is the falling day we recieved a phone call from her and she had Chrsitian in the emergency room to have his hand x-rayed because he hurt it at football practice. Jamie went down to see him and then was asked to take him in for the w-ray because Martha had her infant and another infant she sits with her. After his x-ray was complete Christian asked where I was and Jamie told him that you can come up and see him. Martha quickly came up with the excuse that he couldn't because her father was waiting for them in his car, another 10 minutes would not have hurt him, especially since they had to come back to Kaiser in 30 minutes to get the results of the x-ray, so needless to say Christian did not visit me in the hospital. I don't know if I will ever forgive her for this, I can remember taking him to the hospital at her request to see her parents after they were in a car accident however she refuses to allow him to come up and visit me even though I am in the same hospital that they were at.

Well, I think that is enough for now. I have my appointment in a few hours so wish me well, and hopefully life will continue to return to normal over the next few days and beyond.