Updates have been less frequent because his progress has slowed somewhat. Day by day, he looks a little better, gets a few sutures and staples removed and is able to wake up from time to time. He is reminded daily of where he is and why he is there.
Today, he is on CPAP, which is a slightly less intrusive version of the ventilator. It allows him to initiate breaths on his own, but assists him and provides a higher level of O2. According to the Pulmonologists orders, they plan to see how he does on that for a couple of hours and then draw blood gasses to see how his body is responding. He will remain on the ventilator through surgery, however, if his gases come back well, then they will eventually disconnect it.
He is scheduled to have his skin graft surgery today at noon. They plan to 'steal some skin' from somewhere on his left leg to use in closing the remaining open wounds left from his femur fracture. It is a fairly simple procedure and shouldn't take too long.
His blood pressure is pretty low today without any BP meds. His nurse said that some of the other medications that he is on could be causing it to be so low and because of the reading, he won't be getting any BP meds at this time.
He looks more like himself today than he has throughout this entire ordeal. They took his C-Spine collar off today and he's had a recent shave. His left ear has healed pretty nicely. You can hardly notice the part that's missing at first glance. The plastic surgeon did a remarkable job on his face, and his scars aren't nearly as bad as we had expected them to be.
He still has a huge goose egg on his forehead, but it's a little less prominent now. Most of the swelling has gone down. The only realy swelling that I can notice is in his left leg. It is still about twice it's normal size. He briefly peeped his right eye open when the respiratory therapist was giving him a breathing treatment. I also got to see him smile a little in his sleep.
Overall, he is making progress, even if it seems to be slow. He sustained so many horrible injuries, it's unrealistic for me to expect that he could be awake and aware and able to fully communicate by now. I know it's wishful thinking on my part and he needs to heal at his own pace. I'm sure I'm not alone in feeling this way and I know that we'll all sleep a little better once he is out of the ICU.
A place where we can all come together to show our love and support and get semi-regular updates about Dave.
Words of a Fighter
Without wishful thinking there might not be as much progress. You have a right to those wishes and i am right along with you and all others. Some of his hiking friends in the mountains have been calling for updates. Thank you for sharing so we can get as much positive energy flowing as we can. Also we are sending Linda and all family members positive thoughts and prayers. I love you guys ....Evelyn
ReplyDeleteIt's good to hear the progress. Thank you for keeping us updated sister and thank you Dave for hanging in there. You're in my thoughts often and my friends are all asking me about you. It's the butterfly effect, 6 degrees of separation. You wouldn't believe how many people have you in their hearts and minds. Just today I had another coworker say they went and gave blood for your replenishment and they started to say your name and as they struggled with "VanVoorhis" the lady at the blood bank said, "No worries, I know exactly who you're talking about, we've gotten a lot of people in here for him."
ReplyDeleteGo you!