19 November 2021
Yesterday (well, Thursday), Dr. Tong called to chat. She just wanted to know how things were going. "Horribly!" we screamed. Well, not really. We just told her the yellow slough is winning the war and all the battles, too.
At the time we were speaking Kaiser was in the middle of a two-day sympathy strike for the engineers who have been without a contract for some time now. The pharmacists and nurses had gone on strike last week themselves only to reconcile on Saturday.
So she agreed the next step would be to get Joyce to surgery to deal with the yellow slough but she couldn't guess when. She didn't think it would be possible before December.
But, she said, she was working over Thanksgiving and would keep trying to get a tee time.
And late today, Shamira, another assistant, called to ask Joyce if Friday, Nov. 26 would work. The day after Thanksgiving.
Sure.
So Monday we'll get her Covid test and she'll have a video conference with the anesthesiologist and we'll have to pick up her pre-surgery box with the wipes and the energy drink.
I have the feeling the when Dr. Tong sees how much yellow slough has formed, she'll elect to do more than one deep debridement. But she's thinking it will be one and done, which would get Joyce home by her birthday.
Meanwhile, I'm going to research whether it's legal to light birthday candles in hospital rooms.