It's late, late Friday evening. Why do abrupt changes in my medical status always seem to occur on Friday evenings--just after Urgent Care has closed and the only place for some help is the local ER? I hate the ER. If you're dying--absolutely cannot breathe, having a heart attack, bleeding to death, been shot, etc.--the ER is the place to head. If it's anything else, they're just going to bother you by running every test known to the medical staff so they rule out anything egregious and cover themselves and the hospital from any future claims of negligence.
Anyway, it's late. I've fallen asleep and wake up. Suddenly I notice (or finally pay attention to the fact) that I'm having a lot of trouble breathing. Crud! I'm pretty sure I know what this means. There were no PEs in my lungs, so I probably need supplemental oxygen at night. But the only way I can get it now is by visiting the ER. I definitely don't want to try and sleep without oxygen because O2 levels naturally go down a little as I sleep.
Sorry, Dale. It looks like we get to visit an ER yet again. We head out of the door about 11:30 p.m.
Unfortunately, our insurance changed and now we have to visit Timpanogos Regional Hospital, instead of the American Fork Hospital ER, which is just 1.7 miles from our house. The AF staff is kind of used to seeing me and really listen to what I tell them. When I had the PEs before, I marched into the triage area and said, "I'm having trouble breathing. I just came from my primary care physician's office, where my O2 was in the low 70s, and my blood pressure and heart rate are elevated. I need you to rule out: 1) sepsis or some kind of gross infection throughout my whole body 2) low red blood cell counts that need an infusion 3) pneumonia and 4) pulmonary embolisms." They listened, ran just the tests they needed to for those four conditions, and found the PEs.
Not Timp!
Why can't they just listen to me? After all of this time and all of these treatments and their side effects, they think they know my body better than I do? Ha!
I walked in and told them that I was having trouble breathing, and that I needed supplemental oxygen. I'd had blood work drawn on Wednesday that was all good and a PE scan on Thursday that was negative. I just need supplemental oxygen.
Nope. They get to run their standard battery of tests: chest x-ray, blood work, and more blood work. Each time a test is run, we have to wait 30 minutes to an hour to get the results. They don't even trust the blood count results from Wednesday. What's a girl to do? So far, everything has been normal and not actionable.
So next we get to try a breathing treatment. They don't work. They never work. They just make me feel jittery. I tell that to the poor respiratory therapist who comes to administer the treatment. She listens and offers to go fight it out with the ER doctor. After all, whose insurance company wants to pay for something that I don't want or need? After another 30 minutes of waiting, the ER doctor is back, ready to argue for his point of view. You know what? The area around my chest does feel tighter and more constricted than usual. Fine. I'll let you try the breathing treatment--not to help my lungs but to, hopefully, loosen the constriction and resulting sharp stabbing pains around my entire thoracic cavity. 30 minutes later: one breathing treatment administered, bodily shaking occuring, and the stabbing pains in my chest are lessened by maybe one tiny degree. Are we finally finished?
Another 30 minutes goes by, and it's time for one last chat with the doctor. They could do one more thing (which now I cannot remember), but I know it's going to be useless. I know, and now I know that they know, what I've been saying all night and early morning. My body needs supplemental oxygen. Please! Can we just get a tank and go now? Off the oxygen, my O2 readings drop down to about 73. On oxygen, only about one liter, it jumps right back up to the low 90s. Please!
There's some more delay as they figure out what medical supply company my insurance prefers. They're recommending Alpine Home Medical, but they're having a hard time locating an oxygen tank from Alpine. Finally, someone on another floor finds one tank that isn't labeled. They give it to me (after about 5.5 hours of waiting) with the promise that someone from Alpine will be at our house waiting for us to arrive so that they can deliver a concentrator.
We're finally back home about 4:00 a.m. Luckily, today is Saturday and we get to sleep in just a bit. I'm exhausted!
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