Nana is Home!

Nana was released from the hospital today.  Laura brought her home this afternoon, and it was so much easier than the last time.  Nana had no trouble walking from her car to the house, as we still have the oxygen concentrator.  We had a good evening together.

Laura still has to get some of Nana's medication from The Pharmacy.  The pharmacy called because some of the medications were tagged as allergic, so we still have to figure that out.  The pharmacy spoke with Dr. M, and Nana will be seeing him next week.  There's a bit of confusion about when the appointment is, but that'll be easy to figure out Monday morning.

One thing that's a bit of a concern is one of Nana's incisions is seeping clear fluid.  It seems like walking around encourages this.  It's more of an annoyance than anything, but Laura's keeping an eye on things.

Nana's heart rhythm is still normal.  We're hoping that the a-fib rhythm is a thing of the past.

Home at last

Nana's finally being discharged today.  This time for real.  Laura made the 60 mile drive yet again today up to the hospital.  Traffic on the freeways was miserable, and it took her close to 90 minutes to get to the hospital.  Aunt M and Uncld A were visit with Nana.  I think Aunt D was there as well.  Nana's little hospital room was pretty close to a full house that day.

I called the Oxygen Supply company to get things squared away.  At first they couldn't find the information for me.  The gentleman on the phone said he would call me back in about half an hour.  He called back as promised in the time frame promised.  He said that he found the paperwork, and everything was in order.  He said he would be by in another 30 minutes to drop everything off, and wanted to know how many oxygen tanks we wanted.  Amazing...once things were figured out, they really did a nice job.

About half an hour later, he showed up and delivered three oxygen tanks and a 5 liter oxygen concentrator.  He also provided about 60 feet of tubing and several cannulas to go in Nana's nose  Having 60 feet of tubing gives Nana free reign--she can get into just about any room she desires.

Laura and Nana arrived home around 7pm, and we had a difficult time trying to get Nana into the house.  When she was rounding the bend by the rose bush in front of our house, the air hose popped off the oxygen tank.  Her strength just drained away.  We got it re-connected, and my wife turned it up so she was getting quite a bit of oxygen.  One of the boys brought out a chair, and the other brought out this other walker we have that rolls and has an integrated seat.  Nana sat down for a few minutes, then transferred to the rolling walker and I wheeled her into the house.  It was good to have her home, but it was a difficult night as she needed quite a bit of help.

Interim period

No hospital trips, but lots of visits with Dr. M.  We also had a physical therapist and a home health nurse stop by to check on Nana.  She was doing okay, but knew that she was going to have to go back into the hospital.  There was more fluid buildup during this time, but it was mainly controlled by a diuretic.  She would occasionally have difficulty breathing, but a nebulizer with a breathing treatment seemed to help.

One bright point during this time was that we were able to have our New Year's get together with family.  Having everyone over to visit with Nana really buoyed her spirits.