Tuesday, March 2, 2010

“Bring Him In”

We ended up taking Elias into the FA clinic yesterday after Elias registered two temps of 92.3 & 93.8. After calling in with the symptoms, Dr. Mehta wanted him seen. When we entered the clinic beepers lit up and before we were even settled in the room there were 4 people checking Elias out. They later admitted that they feared based on his symptoms that he had sepsis, which is a severe infection spread via the blood stream. It is deadly and fast. Thankfully it was not that at all. FA patients are particularly susceptible to becoming septic and someone like Elias has multiple ways for infection to be introduces due to all his ostomies and central line. They did draw the standard labs, liver & renal function tests, as well as urine samples. The cultures are growing now and it will be a few days before we know for sure if there is anything there, but it is likely a viral problem. They were comfortable sending us home with pending orders based on findings of various tests. If nothing comes back then it is certain to be viral. It is possible that Elias has another UTI, but we will see what cultures show. So far no calls from the clinic so that is a positive. It was very comforting to know that when we notice something strange we can call for an opinion and when he is needed to be seen it happens lightening quick. I so wish every discipline ran as compassionate and efficiently.

Elias seems to be somewhat improved today. The morning began slow and we thought it would be another one of those days, but it is shaping up better than expected. Elias had a strong OT session today as well. We were not having high hopes for accomplishments, but it proved to be a much better time than we all thought. We introduced Elias to an electric toothbrush today during his OT. He loved it!  

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