Hospital stay update!

Joe will remain at Strong Memorial at least through the weekend. He is scheduled for a bone scan to determine whether the Interferon and Sutent have reversed the cancer in his pelvis and right shoulder. We are very hopeful that this treatment has been effective! He is still suffering from abdominal pain from the infection. The doctors have decided to keep the abdominal catheter in place for a couple more weeks before removing it. The goal is by that time the lymph system will be repaired to stop leaking fluids and his infection will be gone. This ascites has been a horrid nightmare from the start! If this course does not fix the issue, I believe that we'll have to take additional action to clear this up once and for all! I know that he'll feel 100% better without the constant abdominal pain, not to mention the high risk of infection that he has just by having the ascites existing in his abdomen as well as the catheter as an inlet to bacteria. He also needs to go back to eating real food!

He's had some complications with low calcium counts which have manifested itself with cramping in his hands. I believe that was caused by not having any nutrition on Wednesday as they were not 'able' to get his TPN from the pharmacy when we went into emergency. He appears to be OK now and he is back on TPN nightly. He is still pretty weak and very tired due to the pain medication for the infection and out of it much of the time. A game of scrabble with Gina and I knocked him out for several hours.

We will make the best of a bad situation and celebrate Tom's birthday, my dad's birthday and our anniversary in the hospital this weekend.