Staph Infection

Well, as Dr. Culasso said, "ants have showed up at Dom's picnic".

I've got alot of catching up to do. Firstly, let me say that our patient is resting comfortably after being admitted to the hospital yesterday.

We had to report to the Apherisis department for stem cell collection at 8 am on Friday. They collected for about 6 hours. Got home at 8pm.

Had to return at 8 am and had another 8 hours of collection.

Spent the night at Chris' house. He cooked us a lovely dinner.

Reported back at 8am on Sunday (my birthday). They were having a hell of a time trying to open up one of the lines. Finally, at noon, they announced that they had enuf stem cells and we could go home.

Meanwhile..... Dom's collar bone had been killing him. He was also running a temp on Sunday morning..... almost 101. They talked about admitting him, but eventually temp dropped to normal.

They removed to central line, to find that it was screwed up.... digging into his collar bone. Then, they understood why he had been in such pain.

Each day after collection, they run bloodwork which they get read the next morning.

So.... got home early on Sunday and had a very happy birthday. We were tickled to have completed another step of our adventure.

Dom and I slept in yesterday. Took luxurious bubble baths. Laid in bed watching TV. No sooner had Dom said, "Oh, honey- isn't it wonderful to be at home? We don't have to do ANYTHING until Thursday", the phone rang.

It was the cancer center saying that Sunday's bloodwork showed an infection, and Dr. Safah wanted to admit Dom. The 3 of us gave out a collective groan.

They put him back in the Bone Marrow Transplant unit, which is great....nice and sanitary. Did a chest xray, hooked him up on an "all purpose" antibiotic drip and potassium for his painful hand cramps.

We should find out today what type of infection he has. They think it's a staph infection from the stupid central line, but until they know exactly what's up, they're just using ordinary antibiotics.

Christine and I stuck around here (hospital) until 6pm, then headed home.

I got back here at noon. Christine is running her grandmother around today. On the way to the room, I ran into John Rink.... (who I assisted with the bone marrow biopsy months ago) *grinning* Love the man. Anyway, he said that Dom might be going home tomorrow. I still don't know what the hell is going on, but will report when I know something.

I'm spending the night at Lovely Linda's tonite. Dunno much else.