Just Call Me Nurse Ratchett

I'm so sorry to disappoint you all, but we did not break out the Scrabble today...but we did break out of the hospital. Oh yeah...you heard right...we broke out!
The results of the culture came back and it was obviously negative, the infection is NOT growing. Awesome! It will be so nice for my mom to be at home in her own bed and in her own jammies...eating some good food.
The hospital is an interesting place. It's full of so many different emotions...hope, happiness, love, anxiety, sadness...I mean, it's probably the only place on Earth that runs the gamut of emotions...if you could expel all of that energy and use it for good, I think all of the world's problems would be solved. I have also found that when you spend any length of time in there, you start to feel a strange kind of bond with the others that float around the hallways with you. Sometimes you talk to them but most often you don't...you just exchange sympathetic and knowing smiles. There is a a point to this and here it is...during our stay this week, there was a lady that I kept running in to and finally we started to talk. She and her husband (the patient) had been there since August 31st...egads. She told me that they were making arrangements with the hospital to do home health care. The doctors had mentioned this to us as well, but we thought because my mom doesn't have health insurance, this option wasn't available to us. According to my fellow hall wanderer, this was untrue.
So, once both Dr. O'Brien (the hospitalist) and Dr. Paroly said that the results of the culture were negative and she could go home, we immediately began asking how we could get out and go home. Well, all of these lovely, helpful people at the hospital worked out a plan and set us up with home health care!
Here is how it is going to work...and bear with me here...this alot of information...and I apologize if some of this info gets jumbled or confusing.
My mom was to receive a PICC line before we went home, but they were so backed up that we had to reschedule the PICC line for Monday morning. Once her infection clears up, she get a new Medi-port, until then she gets a pick line...but before the PICC line, she just has a regular ol peripheral IV. For those of you who do not know what a pick line is: basically, its just like a regular peripheral IV, except that it can be used for longer periods of time. A regular IV can only be used for 3 days and then has to be moved...a PICC line can stay in for up to 30 days.
Now on to the home health care part...tomorrow morning a nurse will come to the house and set up the meds and then teach me how to administer the meds into the IV, how to clean it, how to flush it and I'm sure a million other things. Her medication will be administered twice a day for 90 minutes until September 30th. The nurse will come to the house 2 times a week to check up on everything and make sure I am doing everything properly. He will also take her blood at those times to see how the infection is doing.
Whew! I gots me alot of learning to do!
I told you all that I was going to be an Oncology nurse eventually and this is just getting me one step closer!
I know that I say this all of the time...but I will keep saying it forever and ever...
Thank you so much, all of you, for all of your love notes, good energy, positive thoughts and spot on humor! Keep em coming!
Thank you for sending out the good vibes for my friend that I spoke about about last night and a big thank you to all of the amazing nurses at Tri-City...the hardest working girls we know! Those girls rock!
So, rest up tonight my friends because you all have alot of information coming to you tomorrow!
...and oh yeah...please feel free to do the happy dance because my mom is HOME!!


"It's what you learn after you know it all that counts."
~Attributed to Harry S. Truman