Hospital Update

Yesterday was not a bad day for Joe! His pain level is decreasing and he said he felt better. He is still pretty weak and his breathing is not great - he is still on oxygen. He had another EKG and Echocardiogram yesterday to determine if his heart is functioning properly as his heart rate is pretty high. All tests came back without issue. His ultrasounds on Tuesday showed that his internal organs are working well - so while there are cancer cells around his organs, they are not in them. The lungs still appear to be the problem.

Today they are going to assess whether they can insert a pic line in his arm for continued IV antiobiotcs as the docs want another 10 days of them infused. This pic line can also be used for the chemotherapy that he wants to try as long as his blood levels are acceptable. Dr Jones' office was suppose to see him regarding the fluid around his lungs but did not come up yesterday. The attending will contact her again today to see if they wish to pull additional fluid from the lung space to try to ease Joe's breathing. The fluid did not test to be cancerous and they belive it to be chylous fluid - not fluid leaking from lung tumors.

Today Dr Lyman and the team should be able to determine when Joe can come home. The attending physician promised to see the home health care department to get us additional nursing help and oxygen delivered to the house. If approved, he will have his chemo in the hospital as previously planned. Joe planed to talk to Dr Kohli yesterday - however - Dr Kohli did not visit with him.

But it was a good day - I went up at 1 pm and warmed him up his pasta dinner and along with his 20 below cocoa that he called Bill to get for him, he was a happy camper. I left to watch the Rangers/Athena game (Rangers won!) and video'd the game for Joe to see. Tom, Kate and I came back to the hospital after the game and he and Tom did a recap of the entire game - play by play! Kate brought cookies, so he happily munched cookies and watched the game.

He gets a little stronger every day, takes a little less pain medication and is more alert. We hope to get him home and resting more comfortably soon!

Love
Vicki, Gina & Tom