Colleen[18]: Learning

[mdlbear]

Went directly from taking the Y.D. to school, to a visit with Colleen -- it's only a couple of blocks. The Wolfling has only one late-morning class on Fridays, so she can take the bus. Spent some time comparison-shopping at a couple of medical equipment stores, looking for lightweight wheelchairs (more specifically, folding transfer chairs) and hospital beds.

Squeezed a half-day of work in around the edges, with a long phone conversation with Colleen's case manager and another with E (whose LJ name I'll probably remember tomorrow sometime) in the middle (missing my noon walk in the process, of course).

The bottom line is that Colleen has to be "housebound" in order for the home care nurse to come out and help for a couple of days. I don't mind shading the truth to get around stupid, inapplicable regulations; the only thing that worries the heck out of me is that I might not pull it off, meaning we'd be stuck without the home nursing care. Which is why I want to make *damned* sure I know what I'm doing before she comes home. Idiots.

As for timing, it takes three business days to push the paperwork through. So the very earliest she could come home is Friday, with Monday more likely. And sometime next week (hopefully) she gets a fistulagram -- a high-contrast CAT scan, I think -- to see whether it's closed. At which point they can make decisions about things like taking her off TPN, and doing the hernia-repair surgery.

So, progress. And I've learned a lot. The nurse doing the IV seems happy to teach me, too, so that's good. I'll probably be back every day this week except for tomorrow (the $COMPANY holiday party -- I'll be taking Joyce, since Colleen is in no position to enjoy a fancy restaurant) and maybe Wednesday.

Comments

[shaddyr]

::hugs you::

Please pass on ((gentle hugs)) to Colleen.

[mdlbear]

Thanks! Will do.

*hugs*

[saffronrose.livejournal.com]

We have one to lend. We need a place to store it, for a bit, anyway, so you may borrow it for a few months.

[mdlbear]

Thanks, though it may not be what we're looking for. In the short term, we have a regular wheelchair that we're renting, and a walker. What we're specifically looking for is something in between: a lightweight transfer chair (no big wheels, so it would be narrower) with handbrakes on the push handles, which would basically double as a wheelchair and a walker.

[saffronrose.livejournal.com]

That sounds awfully close if not spot on to what we have--it folds up, no big wheels, will check on the handbrakes.

Feel free to come over tomorrow and look, if you like. Call 369.9347 to make sure we're home. Irby'ds memorial celebration is today, so we will be out most of the day.

[mdlbear]

We just went out and bought one -- there was money in the flex account that needed spending, and after trying several this was the only one that was big enough and had all the features we wanted (except light weight, but nobody makes 'em out of titanium). We're in it for the long haul in any case: her arthritis isn't going to go away.

But many thanks for the offer -- it was appreciated.

[mia-mcdavid.livejournal.com]

I have a friend who developed an painful and embarrassing boil in a difficult place to reach, especially if you're quite elderly and a little large. She had a home health nurse out to help her until she was caught *looking at her garden*!!! and told that since she left her physical house and stood in her yard she couldn't have the home nursing any more.

Deeply, massively, stupid...

[mdlbear]

As you say. Useful data point, anyway.