Complications or some such - Part 1

 May 8, 2022

As if things aren't already hectic...

Last week was a bit of a whirlwind. Monday, we were slated for Brandon's PET Scan. however upon arrival were informed that THEY had him on their schedule for Monday the 9th. Monday the 2nd was a 9:00 AM Appt, so while I didn't know the time they'd had him scheduled for on the 9th, I can only imagine it was for 2 PM? Maybe they'd transposed their times/dates. 

Craig the radiologist invited us to come back with him to where he ran his scans. There was actually a lady in one of the rooms waiting on her scan and another person having theirs showing up on his monitors. Again, I felt good that he was earnest to talk to us and help us get this appointment rescheduled. So, that was the goal he had then and there. 

He talked to us for a couple minutes, reminded Brandon of the do's and don'ts 24 hours before and the day of the scan. He'd gotten us in on Thursday the 5th at 1 PM. 

Wednesday rolled around and our appointment with pulmonology was that morning at 11:45. Dr. comes in and says, "you're not supposed to be here until later in the year, what's going on?" Well, he's had this cough and it's not gotten better, wicked edema here (pointing at Brandon's side and his legs and feet), his fluid from his cath is "gunky" for lack of a better word, his bandage had some gunk on it from around where the cath comes out of his chest and Sunday, he was literally leaking fluid from his scar. Like soaking wet leaking, making his sheets and his clothes wet and upon walking into the kitchen, leaving drips all over the floor. 

Doc asks for a syringe and taps Brandon's cath and I saw his eyebrows disappear. Think, extra chunky. Yes, that bad.

Me: "See?" Him: "Yeah!" then says to me, "come here and hold this," and handed me the syringe. 

He's frantically trying to stop the cath from literally spewing fluid and wiping up Brandon's pants and the exam table. Got all that squared away and started talking about the edema after one of his nurses came in and took the syringe to have the contents cultured. 

The area around his scar and where the catheter comes out that is hardened and painful is called Induration - generally, a firmness under the skin happening around incisions and often due to poor lymphatic drainage. Hmm. He went on to say that there's obviously some kind of wicked infection going on, no fever, but with the visual of the fluid and the color and the "stuff" in it, very obvious something is going on. 

We'd brought a dressing and drainage kit and he used it to try and drain some of the fluid but got maybe only 10 ml even with manually trying to express it with the pump. Nada. I think the tube is blocked up with gunk personally as we've not been able to get a whole lot out here lately. 

He ordered an ultrasound for him to be done ASAP to check for vascular blockages that might be causing the edema, put in an order for an antibiotic and said we'd talk lymphedema if need be. He talked a little bit about the fact that his albumin levels are low and that he has something called Hypoalbuminemia (say that three times fast). He said that he needs to take as many of the protein shakes as he can handle, eat more protein - fish, chicken, vegetables. Small meals if necessary to help with this. Check! 

We went home armed with some new info and went about our day.