YESTERDAY'S POST = O.B.E. (OVERTAKEN BY EVENTS)

Yesterday started off pretty uneventfully. Usual parade of docs, followed by trip to have a sonogram of her arms. This is S.O.P. in clotting cases like Anna's. They found an old clot in her upper right arm that the body has already built a bypass around, so no worries about having the same problems as with her foot.

Then it's off to PET scan. I understand they got good imagery so now we wait for somebody to interpret them and go from there.

Then it's back to the room to hang out until the therapy folks stop by to do their thing. We got Anna up on her feet for a minute or two and the goal was to sit in the chair for about an hour. It turned out to be over three.

The patient care tech nurse's aide came in to take her vital signs and I mentioned to her it was time to get Anna back in bed and could she get the nurse. She said she could help and we started getting set to move her.

Instead of going around the chair , N.A. Two Left Feet starts to step over the I.V. lines, and promptly demonstrates why you DO NOT STEP OVER I.V. LINES. Before I can say, "WTF ARE YOU DOING?!?!", she stumbles and stomps on Anna's lines.

In addition to the exquisite pain caused by jerking the hell outta something that is stitched to the side of the neck, the catheter* running into the Superior Vena Cava gets pulled almost all the way out. There is only about an inch left in her neck, just enough to keep the blood from pouring out.

(*The central line is actually 2 catheters, one inside the other. The outer one is stitched to the neck and the inner one is threaded thru it to the superior vena cava.)

So I hit the call button and tell 'em I need the nurse now, N.A. Nitwit sez, "let me take a look..", I tell her she's done enough damage, she's not to be near my wife again and to get the hell out. The nurse comes in and assesses the damage and sez she'll have to call the doc to find out what to do, and he'll probably want to...

"This is what's gonna happen. The doc is gonna hem and haw and have you jump thru hoops while he tries to assess the situation over the phone, wasting time and he will eventually come to the decision I already have - The catheter has been pulled too far out to try and re-thread, so she has to go back down and have a new one put in. Then more time will be pissed away while the team gets their shit together to do the procedure, then even more time is wasted while transportation gets their thumb outta their ass and gets someone up here to take her down, and all the while the therapeutic level of heparin in her system gets burned away and we are losing ground."

"Well, I'll check with the doc..."

"I just over ruled every doctor in this place. So you get back to the desk, get on the horn and let all concerned parties know the game plan and to get ready to get it done and hope I don't decide to make everyone's life difficult by raising hell about this incident, and PRAY there are no complications."

About 2 hours later we're back in the room with a new, sturdier central line in place and more apologies than I can shake a stick at.

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That was yesterday.