I'm blogging today from Jai's hospital room :-(. She was admitted on Sunday for treatment of an asthma exacerbation. She has been what we call a "wheezer," requiring albuterol nebulizer treatments as needed, since she was about two. They don't like to label kids under 6 (i think that's the right age) as asthmatics for insurance purposes as they may wheeze but not actually have asthma. But I think the verdict is in for jai; she has asthma. She began having symptoms on Saturday evening that worsened Sunday morning, so we decided to bring her in. I thought that she may need continuous nebulizer treatments but I had hoped that we could avoid it. On admission, her chest was so tight that no wheezes could be heard (all bad). So she was placed on 40% oxygen with continuous nebs. They tried to wean her off the continuous treatments last night but she began to drop her oxygen saturations, requiring oxygen via nasal cannula. She subsequently started to retract or use her accessory muscles to breath, so they had to put her back on continuous nebs.
Needless to say, these last few days have been a whirlwind for us. I thank God that my residency program and the people that I work with have been so understanding, allowing me to take the time off to be with my little love. They have been constantly checking on us to see if we need anything and even brought Jai a card, bear and balloons. I've also gotten wonderful support from my family and all of you who have sent messages and texts to check on us. Your concern has not gone unnoticed and I appreciate all of the prayers for her speedy recovery more than you all know.
Jai is just ready to go home. Today, she told me that the doctors keep saying she has to stay on this mask and that she can't eat but they don't know how it feels because they don't have to wear it. That is quite a profound statement coming from a child. Y'all know I try to find the lesson in everything and I am pretty sure that that is my lesson. As a doctor it's easy to say that the patient should just take this medicine or remain NPO (nothing by mouth) for days because that's what best from our perspective, but we have to take the time to put ourselves in their shoes. It's very easy for you to say someone should do something when you aren't the one who has to do it, or suffer through it.
I also learned the importance of explaining procedures to patients from another comment that Jai made. They had to draw some blood from her IV line and she told me that the doctors were gonna make her dead because they keep taking her blood. Of course, I was extremely disturbed by her thinking she was going to die. I had to explain to her that they were just getting a little blood for lab work and not enough to hurt her. I also explained that her mama would never let that happen! I wouldn't even allow the phlebotomist to stick her again for blood this morning and told them they'd have to try to draw it from her I, as they had to stick her THREE times on admission. I wasn't going to let it happen again. (I know...Doctors make the worst patients (and patient's moms!)).
I always say there's a lesson in everything and I've already learned quite a few since being here. Ultimately, I just want my sweet baby girl to get better and get back to normalcy. I hope that you all will continue to pray for her and I'll do my best to keep you all posted.
Sorry for the short, stream of conciousness blog this week!
Mahogany Pearl: "Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God" - unknown
Love, Your Favorite MD,
Keisha B.
No comments:
Post a Comment