Joyce's KP Adventure mikepasini.com headlines
After a Lull
15 January 2025
Two weekends ago I suffered a severe head cold that knocked me out of the rotation for 10 days, coughing and blowing my nose. I didn't, however, have a temperature. But if there's one place you are not welcome when you are sick, it's a skilled nursing facility. There are just too many vulnerable people there.
So from Jan. 3 to 13, I didn't visit Joyce -- and didn't update this account because, well, I didn't have anything to write about. We did text, but I couldn't speak after losing my voice, so there were no phone calls.
But Tuesday I returned briefly to find her in bed at lunch time. I encourage her to take a few bites before I left. I didn't see anyone or get an update, although Loren, the Kaiser social worker, tried to get in touch.
I did go home with three soiled Ace bandages to wash for the next day.
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TODAY (Wednesday) I took my three-bus trip to see her, got her out of bed (despite her howls of protest) and into the wheelchair. We rolled around the place to the scale where I weighed her in the 37 lb. chair at 167, a loss of two pounds. After that we went to the gym where I put her on the SciFit. She wasn't happy about it (as you can see in the picture) but she did it for 15 minutes.
During which time I asked the RNAs if she'd walked at all since I was away. They have charts they consult. Not since Jan. 3, they said. She refused.
Well, I explained, she always refuses. So I don't ask. I just take off her hospital socks and put her shoes on and get her to the side of the bed so she can stand on the walker and transfer to the wheelchair.
We agreed to get her off the SciFit and on a walker to walk back to her room and get in bed. And she did that, screaming all the way. It's the fear of falling, she told me. But there was an RNA on each side of her, a belt around her waist and me with the wheelchair right behind. So there really was no place to fall.
So she's strong enough and capable but still avoiding normal physical activity.
She needed a diaper change when she got back to bed so the RNAs called the CNA who came in to do it.
Meanwhile Binita the Treatment Nurse came in to tell me she thought the odor from the wound had increased along with the discharge from the wound. So she took a photo, alerted the Kaiser doctor at the facility (Dimaano) who sent it on to Dr. Tong and Jennnifer Spitnale, the Wound Care Clinic RN.
Meanwhile I noticed the diaper change had dislodge the wound dressing, which was done with paper bandages because they had run out of Mepilex. I could have brought some and promised to bring some tomorrow, even though they expect a delivery. Ridiculous.
Binita repaired the wound dressing so it wouldn't get infected by Joyce's diarrhea (which she find humiliating). I discussed that with Binita, asking her to convey my concern to the doctor because I doubted Joyce could express anything but humiliation. It may not be from dementia (and certainly isn't from the prune juice) but may be from her earlier constipation, I learned.
Binita texted me the photo of the wound she took today so I'd know what Joyce's doctors were talking about.
That's when I had to leave to catch my first bus back home, riding packed like sardines in my last bus with the kids from Lincoln High School. All very polite, I should add.
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I missed Loren at the SNF and because I've lost my voice didn't return her phone call but I did text her.
I suspect she wants to talk about discharge. I haven't been able to do anything about that, of course. She can't come home, she needs more care than I, as an invalid myself, can provide. But I don't know where she can go. And wherever that is, will be prohibitively expensive. Unless, I keep telling myself, it's just for a month or two with serious rehab to get her on her feet again.
Golden Heights has really done nothing at all for her. She is in the same situation she was when she first went there.
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ABOUT AN HOUR after I got home, Jennifer the RN called to schedule a debridement and cultures at the Wound Care Clinic. She saw Binita's photo and didn't think it looked infected so she ordered twice daily dressing changes (where are they going to get the supplies for that?) in the meantime.
We have a 4 p.m. Friday appointment with Jennifer. All we have to do is figure out how to get Joyce there. I still can't drive so it looks like another $240 for a wheelchair transport.
What a nightmare this has been.