January 20, 2017
Den had a fairly good night. He has been NPO (no food or drink) since midnight. Luck for him, he has slept well and has not complained about hunger or thirst.
Just before shift change, the nurse let us know that the results on the cultures came back from the lab…no growth! WOOHOO! So Den would be going for the heart cath this morning. She also let us know that Den would be getting his usual morning meds when he got back to his room when the procedure was done.
They came to get Den at 8:30AM. We went to the pre-op holding area and the nurses there did their usual thing….vitals, etc. Den was finally taken in for the procedure around 10:45AM. The nurses had my cell phone number to let me know when he was done and I told them I would wait for their call in his room (it was a lot more comfortable than the waiting area). The call that he was done a came around 11:30AM. To my surprise, the nurse told me that he was already on his way back to his room, so I should just stay where I was for now.
Holly came by just after Den got back to his room. She said that all of the numbers looked good. The team suspected that he was a little dehydrated and that they would hold his Bumex today. We would plan to resume his Bumex at a lower daily dose. She said that Den could go home today and she was working on that.
At 1PM, the doctor came in to insert Den’s PICC line. It was placed in his left upper arm and covered with a sterile dressing….very similar to his drive line.
The hospital social worker came in to let us know that she was working on getting home health set up to do his daily infusions at home. She had to coordinate medication deliveries, equipment rentals and the nurse to come 2-3 times a week. She said that she would keep us updated as things progressed. About an hour later she came back to let us know that Medicare and Den’s supplement didn’t cover home infusions. It would cost us $700 per week to go ahead with home infusion! I literally said, “Hell, NO!” and told her we could not afford that kind of expense. She then tried to tell us that there were no infusion centers near us that were open 7 days a week. I found that really hard to believe, so I got out the computer and started searching! Within 5 minutes, I had found 3 close to home, that I confirmed by phone, that were open 7 days a week! Her closest option had been 40 minutes away, where mine were 10-15 minutes away. We finally settled on a local hospital that had a 7 day a week infusion center. We had an appointment for tomorrow morning at 8:30AM.
It was official that Den would be discharged tonight! All lights were green for him to go home. He just needed his Rocephin IV before he could leave. As soon as it was done running, we were running for the door! It was so nice to get home and relax with our family! The last week had been hard on all of us, but we had weathered the storm and now we could bask in the light of a new day.
Den's LVAD 