Joyce's KP Adventure mikepasini.com headlines
Reading in Bed
14 January 2026
Today was a quiet day for Joyce. She hasn't been out of bed and on her feet since Thursday. A week ago.
Even though she's bedridden at the hospital (and not exercising or walking), I still go over there at lunch time to make sure she eats something once a day. It's a fight. The staff tells her to "eat more" before they take the tray away and I open things and put them under her nose but she has no appetite.
So I check her lab results each day.
The anemia is one thing:
- Her Complete Blood Count test shows her White Blood Cell count over the 11.1 limit at 12.6, probably from the bacteria in the wound which is being addressed by the antibiotics.
- Her Red Blood Cell count is 3.23, under the 3.6 minimum.
- Her Hgb is 8.9 and should be greater than 11.5
- Her Hemocrit is just 28 and should be over 34.
- Her RPW, RBC count is 17.4 and should be under 16.5.
- Her Platelettes are 505 and should be under 400.
So a lot of misses there.
On the dehydration front:
- Her eGFR is 47 and should be over 60.
- Her BUN is 32 and should be under 27.
- Her Creatinine is 1.21 and should be under 1.11.
And her blood pressure is no comfort either, still just making it to 100. So they give her medication for that hypotension. But I've not seen it at 120 for a while now.
She may be discharged tomorrow after Dr. Holland examines her. Or they may keep her until Friday.
Meanwhile I'm trying to figure out her Medi-Cal coverage for this year with her social worker. Her share of cost is over $4,200 a month but she is still being billed $100 a month for Kaiser's Senior Advantage. We want to keep that because it provides access to her wound care team (which the San Mateo County coverage, which would be free, would not).
And then there's the matter of her $0.08 monthly interest on her Bank of America account which Medi-Cal has threatened to drop her over if we don't provide a bank statement by Jan. 9 (we got the notice Jan. 10). I pointed out to the social worker that rounds to zero.
I'll talk to the social worker tomorrow to get some clarity (for of us) on this. I'm very clear on the problems. But she's in charge of resolving them.
Meanwhile, Joyce is in bed reading two-minute mysteries.