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dcnovice -> DC Update: Plans and Needles (6/17/2014 7:23:38 PM)
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June 17, 2014
Plans and Needles
Dear Ones ---
This goes on a bit, so let me cut to the chase for those not keen on scrolling to China:
Surgery is currently slated for Wednesday, June 25th, at Georgetown.
Friday the 13th proved a lucky day for yours truly. A dear friend and I met with an infectious disease specialist, who impressed us enormously. I knew I was in good hands when he greeted me with “I’ve heard all about you from your plastic surgeon!” I appreciated his caring, candid approach to vanquishing TEFI (the everlasting, f’ing infection)—which, I decided, has lingered long enough to warrant its own acronym.
He outlined a blessedly workable plan: an oral antibiotic with each meal, and one 30-minute infusion a day. Given that my surgeon had warned I might need three to four daily IVs, this was welcome news indeed. The excitement would start on Monday, June 16th. He’d call my pharmacy to order the oral antibiotics, and Medstar Home Infusion would handle the rest.
Buoyed by the news, I enjoyed the weekend, grateful to dear friends who pried me out of the apartment both days. No mean feat, that.
Then came Monday, a very Monday sort of Monday. I awoke exhausted, and not even Diet Coke revived me. I settled down and waited for all the medical machinery to begin. The gears were slow to turn. First, I called my pharmacy to see if the good folks there could deliver my pills. They’d be happy to, they explained, except that they’d received no prescription. So I called the doctor's office. It turned out that he’d called a pharmacy with a 410 area code. The receptionist and I concluded hopefully that he must have phoned the Medstar pharmacy in Baltimore, which would deliver the pills along with the IV antibiotics.
Wishful thinking. The box from the pharmacy arrived mid-afternoon on Monday. It contained five baseball-size containers of IV antibiotics, enough tubing to stretch to Mars, syringes full of saline and heparin (for flushing the line), needles, a huge waste container, and God knows what else. But no pills.
Solange, the visiting nurse arrived a while later, after two panicked calls about her parking difficulties. I like to imagine myself a compassionate guy and called the building manager to get permission for Solange to park in the circular driveway (which, alas, turned out to be full). But honestly, I thought, “This really isn’t my problem, hon.”
Except that it was. Solange reached the apartment a bit after three, and her car could only stay put till four. So we were rushed. She got the needle into my port more or less on the first try. (It took some repositioning.) She hooked me up to the IV and got things going. We breezed through paperwork and my vital signs, and we arranged for the pharmacy to deliver a sturdier patch/cover for the port needle, since the one Solange had placed there was already peeling off. My skin likes breathing free and takes poorly to adhesives.
Knowing Solange’s parking plight, I cheerfully—and foolishly—assured her I could handle flushing the port once the infusion was done. After all, I’d done it plenty of times before. I even, I confess, yielded to the temptation to show off and recited the mnemonic for the order of operations—SASH (saline, antibiotic, saline, heparin). She seemed reassured (about my flushing finesse) and relieved (about her car), so off she went.
I swiftly realized I’d made a mistake. The infusion finished, and I hooked up the saline syringe. It took all the force I could muster to force the liquid into the tubing. Even allowing for some loss of strength since last November, it should not have been that hard. I had the same problem with the heparin. Eventually I was done and tried to relax.
Two things prevented that. First, the dressing over the needle had almost completely come off. That raised huge doubts about whether the needle would stay in overnight, particularly given my tossing and turning. Second, the needle hurt like hell—far more than it should have. Given my fear of a needle accident (it’s fallen out before) and the knowledge that a nurse would be back today, I made the command decision a few hours later to pull the damn thing out. Good call. I instantly felt better and was able to enjoy the blessed relief of a shower.
The other post-Solange activity was calling the doctor back, spending a small eternity on hold, explaining that I still hadn’t seen my pills, and getting the prescription phoned in to a pharmacy near the house. I was too tired to attempt picking them up last night and decided, à la Mrs. Butler, that I’d think about that tomorrow.
Today brought another bout of exhaustion and an afternoon visit from a new nurse, named Baba. He apparently parked without involving me, which was a good start. He then managed to get the needle in fairly smoothly. But there, alas, my luck evaporated. The line didn’t flush properly, which meant the needle had to come out. A fresh needle failed too. That was the last one—which, frankly, was a relief. I fought back tears, more of frustration than pain, as he called his boss and worked out that she’d come around five and take a literal stab at the challenge.
That plan didn’t wow me. By that point, I keenly wanted to do what I should have done all along: go to Georgetown and have the experienced IV nurses that “access the port,” as this exciting operation is technically called. In fact, that had been my initial plan for Monday morning, but I had no energy for trekking across town. Baba put his boss on the phone, and she persuaded me to stay home and rest rather than head to Georgetown in the heat.
I vegged for a while, then remembered that I had to brave the heat anyway, to get my pills. (Remember them?) I trudged there to learn that the prescription had gone to a different CVS, several blocks away. It was a short but tiring walk, though at least I finally had my pills. Thank God for small mercies.
I got home in time for a call from Baba’s boss, ruefully reporting that she didn’t have the right kind of needle to pierce me. I was thrilled because that gave me an excuse to say “Thanks, so much, but I’m definitely heading to Georgetown now.” She called back five minutes later to say she’d found one, but I pretended I’d already left and was on my cell. Sometimes dishonesty is the best policy.
It took an age to get a cab, and I confess I got a bit mopey. Okay, a lot mopey. But I eventually reached the alma mater, and my sense of humor—dormant for several days at that point—awoke, to my great delight. As the somewhat gruff receptionist asked for my birth date, I joked, “Everyone asks that, but no one sends a card.” I got a belly laugh and a playful promise that she would. Running into a nurse who’d accessed me before, I trotted out the old classic “We have to stop meeting like this.” She chuckled and agreed. When Mary Ellen, the kind nurse who’d landed me on her plate, marveled that my blood pressure was better than hers, I assured her, “It’s genetic. Nothing in my lifestyle would account for this.” And we laughed over the memory of a blood-drive nurse, years ago, who was visibly irked by my good numbers—because, I’m sure, they robbed her of the chance to scold a fat guy about hypertension.
Not Oscar Wilde material, I know, but it was such a blessing to laugh and lighten up. Between laughs, Mary Ellen got the needle in swiftly and deftly. It flushed perfectly and remains in place, helped by several yards of tape. Tonight’s infusion went smoothly, I’m grateful to report.
I realize I’ve gone on at some length over relative minutiae, exactly the sort of stuff I’d slash from anyone else’s prose. Thanks for making it this far! As I mentioned above, the next big adventure is my oft-postponed surgery, now slated for Wednesday, June 25th—a week from tomorrow. Further bulletins as events warrant.
As ever, thanks and love!
Cheers,
DC
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