Tuesday, July 20, 2004
"Take 10 quick sips of water without breathing,"
I told my mother, tonight, when she began hiccuping, again, just as I was settling her into bed.
"I think I'd rather have the hiccups," she said.
She's been experiencing the hiccups a lot in the last, oh, I'd say over a year. I've mentioned it to two of her doctors, her PCP and her hematologist. They cite her imaging studies, her lack of gastro-intestinal disorders (which, of course, is in direct opposition to their insistence that she must have some kind of gastro-intestinal bleeding going on because of her recurrent iron deficiency anemia) and tell me, "We don't really know why hiccups occur."
This is one area of her health which I haven't researched. Today, though, she had five separate episodes, all gone within less than a minute or two. We've tried almost every suggestion of which she and I have ever heard, except drinking water from a glass backwards. Her hiccups seem resistant to anything but their own whims. I believe they are benign but could be controlled if we could hit upon the right technique. I mentioned this to her tonight and she said, "Don't worry about it. The only one they bother is you."
Which is true. I'll probably research them anyway, though, within the next few days.
This evening I realized that I probably should have been recording, along with what she eats, how much liquid I force her to drink every day in order to keep her hydrated. This occurred to me because, today, I think it took about a quart less than usual, and adequate hydration occurred a good couple hours before dinner. I was so thrilled I started to cry. She couldn't have been harboring E. Coli in her intestinal tract since October 25 and still be alive, but it is entirely possible that she may have had some other bug or two up there for some time and the Cipro XR wiped them out, as well as the E. Coli. Or, today could have just been a blip. I hope it wasn't. The next few days will "do to tell", as my mother says.
Speaking of Cipro, we both caught something interesting, this evening on one of Mom's regular stops in her doctor show circuit, Strong Medicine. A patient in the ER was suffering from what appeared to be seizures (I was only half listening so I'm not sure of the details but the patient was flailing on a gurney). One of the doctors looked in her purse and found "doggy meds" that she had apparently been taking instead of the costly "Cipro", which another doctor had prescribed to her for "coughing". When I heard that, Mom and I said, simultaneously, "Coughing?!?" Everything I've read and noticed about Cipro and everything Mom has experienced from it caused us to both question this little bit of medentertainment information. Considering its power and its side effects, neither of us could imagine that any doctor would blithely prescribe this medication for simply "coughing". We both wondered out loud as a result how much of the medical information spewed through the set in the name of entertainment is not only incorrect but misleads people into badgering their doctors for medications that are clearly inappropriate and, for that matter, how often doctors give in to the pressure just to get one patient out in 15 minutes and another patient in. I know that my mother's PCP doesn't do this because he's used to me doing the research and questioning his choices. I know, too, though, that lots of patients who for one reason or another trust in doctors across the board or mistrust in their own ability to understand any research they might do on behalf of their own health aren't as circumspect as I am regarding my mother's meds. I didn't become adequately circumspect about her meds until my mother's blood pressure crash in the fall of 2002 from the simultaneous dosage of Prednizone and furosemide which were prescribed to bring severe feet swelling under control. Now, whether or not I mention it here, I research everything. If anything I read provokes the slightest bit of suspicion I immediately question the prescription and/or recommendation for treatment and/or modify the dosage requirements and instructions. Lots more people need to be doing this.
This afternoon as our oxygen guy was packing his van preparing to leave we were finishing a discussion about the forcefulness of my e's to him when I inform him of the supplies we need on his next visit. I didn't apologize for this but, in an effort to explain, I told him that, over the last few years, I'd found it necessary to become so assertive as to border on aggressive with health care personnel, especially nurses and doctors, and that I tend not to notice when this assertiveness splashes over, inappropriately, onto those employed in the delivery of medical supplies.
"With doctors," he said, "I just follow their orders and find that this works best."
"If I had done that, my mother would be dead, now."
As I expected, he gave me that, "You're exaggerating" look and changed the subject.
I didn't bother to tell him that I wasn't. Until it happens to you, you don't believe others' tales of medically prescribed mistakes. And besides, take it from me, part of my continual exhaustion is due to all the work it takes to try to keep my mother minimally protected from both the non-alternative and the alternative health care systems. It isn't just the doctors, or the nurses, or the hospitals, or the insurance system. It is the entire area of health care that is the problem right now. Its current accelerated state of flux adds a touch of danger, as well, because everyone is trying to protect themselves from being accountable for the myriad mistakes that are, at this time, inherent in the system. I don't blame people who don't try to keep up with it. I can't assuredly state that my heightened efforts to both utilize health care to my mother's advantage and protect her from its tragic ruts won't keep my mother from being lost in one of medicine's pot holes. I hope this doesn't happen but it wouldn't surprise me if it did.
Damn, it's four minutes after 0100 and the dryer just stopped. No wonder I'm tired. Time to recycle the clothes and go to bed.
Later.
"I think I'd rather have the hiccups," she said.
She's been experiencing the hiccups a lot in the last, oh, I'd say over a year. I've mentioned it to two of her doctors, her PCP and her hematologist. They cite her imaging studies, her lack of gastro-intestinal disorders (which, of course, is in direct opposition to their insistence that she must have some kind of gastro-intestinal bleeding going on because of her recurrent iron deficiency anemia) and tell me, "We don't really know why hiccups occur."
This is one area of her health which I haven't researched. Today, though, she had five separate episodes, all gone within less than a minute or two. We've tried almost every suggestion of which she and I have ever heard, except drinking water from a glass backwards. Her hiccups seem resistant to anything but their own whims. I believe they are benign but could be controlled if we could hit upon the right technique. I mentioned this to her tonight and she said, "Don't worry about it. The only one they bother is you."
Which is true. I'll probably research them anyway, though, within the next few days.
This evening I realized that I probably should have been recording, along with what she eats, how much liquid I force her to drink every day in order to keep her hydrated. This occurred to me because, today, I think it took about a quart less than usual, and adequate hydration occurred a good couple hours before dinner. I was so thrilled I started to cry. She couldn't have been harboring E. Coli in her intestinal tract since October 25 and still be alive, but it is entirely possible that she may have had some other bug or two up there for some time and the Cipro XR wiped them out, as well as the E. Coli. Or, today could have just been a blip. I hope it wasn't. The next few days will "do to tell", as my mother says.
Speaking of Cipro, we both caught something interesting, this evening on one of Mom's regular stops in her doctor show circuit, Strong Medicine. A patient in the ER was suffering from what appeared to be seizures (I was only half listening so I'm not sure of the details but the patient was flailing on a gurney). One of the doctors looked in her purse and found "doggy meds" that she had apparently been taking instead of the costly "Cipro", which another doctor had prescribed to her for "coughing". When I heard that, Mom and I said, simultaneously, "Coughing?!?" Everything I've read and noticed about Cipro and everything Mom has experienced from it caused us to both question this little bit of medentertainment information. Considering its power and its side effects, neither of us could imagine that any doctor would blithely prescribe this medication for simply "coughing". We both wondered out loud as a result how much of the medical information spewed through the set in the name of entertainment is not only incorrect but misleads people into badgering their doctors for medications that are clearly inappropriate and, for that matter, how often doctors give in to the pressure just to get one patient out in 15 minutes and another patient in. I know that my mother's PCP doesn't do this because he's used to me doing the research and questioning his choices. I know, too, though, that lots of patients who for one reason or another trust in doctors across the board or mistrust in their own ability to understand any research they might do on behalf of their own health aren't as circumspect as I am regarding my mother's meds. I didn't become adequately circumspect about her meds until my mother's blood pressure crash in the fall of 2002 from the simultaneous dosage of Prednizone and furosemide which were prescribed to bring severe feet swelling under control. Now, whether or not I mention it here, I research everything. If anything I read provokes the slightest bit of suspicion I immediately question the prescription and/or recommendation for treatment and/or modify the dosage requirements and instructions. Lots more people need to be doing this.
This afternoon as our oxygen guy was packing his van preparing to leave we were finishing a discussion about the forcefulness of my e's to him when I inform him of the supplies we need on his next visit. I didn't apologize for this but, in an effort to explain, I told him that, over the last few years, I'd found it necessary to become so assertive as to border on aggressive with health care personnel, especially nurses and doctors, and that I tend not to notice when this assertiveness splashes over, inappropriately, onto those employed in the delivery of medical supplies.
"With doctors," he said, "I just follow their orders and find that this works best."
"If I had done that, my mother would be dead, now."
As I expected, he gave me that, "You're exaggerating" look and changed the subject.
I didn't bother to tell him that I wasn't. Until it happens to you, you don't believe others' tales of medically prescribed mistakes. And besides, take it from me, part of my continual exhaustion is due to all the work it takes to try to keep my mother minimally protected from both the non-alternative and the alternative health care systems. It isn't just the doctors, or the nurses, or the hospitals, or the insurance system. It is the entire area of health care that is the problem right now. Its current accelerated state of flux adds a touch of danger, as well, because everyone is trying to protect themselves from being accountable for the myriad mistakes that are, at this time, inherent in the system. I don't blame people who don't try to keep up with it. I can't assuredly state that my heightened efforts to both utilize health care to my mother's advantage and protect her from its tragic ruts won't keep my mother from being lost in one of medicine's pot holes. I hope this doesn't happen but it wouldn't surprise me if it did.
Damn, it's four minutes after 0100 and the dryer just stopped. No wonder I'm tired. Time to recycle the clothes and go to bed.
Later.
