Somehow, Wires Were Crossed

Everything went fine.

Everything, that is, except that I wasn't scheduled for the procedure I thought I was to have.

See? I told you something wasn't going to go as advertised.

We checked in at the hospital and they set me up in my own room, in a portion of the hospital they call "Care Suites." I've been in there a few times, as a volunteer, delivering the box lunches they order up for the patients. My room, in fact, was right next to the fridge I usually put the lunches in, so I knew precisely where I was. I'm still not really sure what they do there, but it's got something to do with looking after people who have radiologic procedures done (Ya think?), and people who need more monitoring after same day surgery. Perhaps? I dunno. Anyway, after putting on one of those HIDEOUS gowns, they did the standard stuff, vitals, IV inserting, blood taking, running through medical stuff, handing off the remote control for the tee vee, you know, the regular. When it came time for the procedure, a very nice radiology RN wheeled me (yes, I was in bed, and it was, again, very luxurious) down to CT. They got me settled in, and it was then that a problem arose.

The RN started talking about how the procedure was to be done, and when she reached the end of her schpiel, I was a bit confused. She had described how they were going to take some preliminary images with the cat scanner, the radiologist would claim her stake on my lymphocele, then they'd be running me in and out of the scanner in between draining the lymphocele, to make sure they had everything. She asked if I understood, and I said, I did. "So," I asked, "how long do you have to wait before you inject the alcohol?" She looked at me queerly, and said, "Why would you think you were having that done?"
"Because that's what I was told would be happening. That after draining it, you'd put alcohol into it so it would create scar tissue and would shrink up."

"Ok," she said, and went into the control room, to chat with the radiologist.

This is the point where I muttered, "Houston, we have a problem."

The problem being that Dr. Academic's main nurse didn't write up the order for the alcohol procedure, but rather for a simple draining of the lymphocele (or "suspected lymphocele", because they're still not sure that's what it is.). Now, I'm not really sure why, when I talked to her on Friday, and we chatted specifically about the alchohol procedure, she didn't say, "But, Kathy, that's not what you're having. You'll simply have it drained, and we want to do it this way because it might work, and it's less invasive." But she didn't say that. She talked about the alcohol procedure, and that's all she talked about, SO HELLO, that's what I thought I was having. I mean, am I dumb or something, because she NEVER mentioned draining the thing outside the context of this certain procedure. NO ONE in that bloody office who I chatted to about it said ANYTHING about simple drainage, because, and I quote, "Chances are it'll just fill right back up." It sounded to me as if they weren't going to waste their time with that procedure, and Dr. Academic thought it would be better to skip to the step that did work.

So, they ran around the control room for about a half hour, calling Dr. Academic's nurse, then they got a hold of Dr. Academic himself, and he ok'ed the procedure. I just couldn't get my head around why he wanted me to do this, when it had seemed like he'd ixne'd it right off the bat. I was confused and tried to explain to the RN that this is what we had talked about and that this is what I had signed up for. And she didn't doubt me one iota. She said, "You obviously know what you're talking about, but we just need to be clear about this." The radiologist came out and we chatted. She recommended having the procedure done, because it was less invasive and it was going to be more "comfortable" than having the alcohol procedure done. The crux of the matter was this: it was either drain the sucker, or that would be that. My choice. I chose to drain it, but am still bewildered as to why the wires got crossed in the first place.

As far as these sorts of things go, it was pretty easy to bear. In and out of the machine, marking the injection point with a sharpie, in and out of the machine again, then they gave me the IV sedation drugs, the radiologist numbed my belly up with some lidocaine, cleaned me off with iodine, and then did her thing. Then they ran back into the control room and ran me in and out again. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Until it was over and done with, by which time one of the lymphocele's walls had collapsed, 44cc of supposed lymphatic fluid (it was yellow, that's all I can tell you) was sent off to pathology, and the doctor had put a band-aid on my wound. I was wheeled back to Care Suites, and since I hadn't been allowed to eat or drink for four hours before, devoured a box lunch I am sure one of my fellow volunteers schlepped up there a few hours before.

They let me go about fifty-minutes after the procedure was done, and I was happy to get out of that place. I got a wheelchair ride to the door, and our friend ML picked us up. Then I came home and napped for about two hours.

As of right now, I'm simply sore in that neighborhood. They told me to take advil for any pain. I wish I could take a bath and soak some of the pain away, alas, however bathing is verboten until the injection site is completely healed. Bummer. I didn't think the IV sedation was all that bad, but if I'm up and moving, I'm not really enjoying life all that much. Even now, sitting at my desk, writing this, I'm getting woozy. If I stay down on the sofa or in bed, I'm ok, so that is where I shall be heading shortly.

Thanks for all the well wishes, prayers and everything. I appreciate them. You're a lovely bunch of coconuts, my devoted Cake Eater readers. But now you need to send them Russ and Janis' way, because they've had a rough couple of weeks and it's shortly to be compounded by the fact they're not going to get hardly any sleep for the next few months.

Posted by Kathy at March 11, 2008 09:02 PM | TrackBack