I need to vent, and this is the only place I could think of. Attention Health Care Providers. If you wonder why people sometimes seem unreasonable or edgy, maybe this will give you some insight.

Monday, 9:10 PM: Patty falls, bumping her head and using her arms to break her fall. Bad idea with the right arm. Re-injures and flares up RSD. Ambulance comes as she is unable to get up even with my help. Ambulance worker, after having been briefed by me on her tunneled epidural catheter steps on same while lifting her onto stretcher, pulling it out of it's spot in her spine.

Hospital takes x-rays of cervical spine to see if catheter is dislodged. No one at hospital can tell. She is sent home about 2:00 AM. I stay up with her and tend to her pain, giving her toradol shots and back rubs. I go to work that morning.

Tuesday 7:30 PM. I arrive home from work only to find her in terrible pain. I call our home nurse's answering service. Recieve a call back in about an hour. Wrong nurse. Call answering service back. Recieve a call back in about a half an hour. Wrong nurse again.

I give up on visiting nurse, and call the hospital. Ask who's on call for our family doc. Hospital won't page them as they don't think it's an emergency. Call family doc at home, ask him to call the stuck up switchboard person at hospital and tell them it IS an emergency. He does. They call the doc on call, Patty gets some meds to get her through until morning.

Go to sleep in chair at 11:00 PM. Wake up at 1:00 AM, give Patty toradol shot, massage. Stay up rest of night. 8:00 AM up and call doctors at Cleveland Clinic for evaluation on her catheter, is it displaced? Only I get a recording telling me they don't open until 8:00 AM. Call back at eight fifteen, and eight thirty, and eight forty five. Call the main number and complain. Am told that the office hadn't taken their phone off of Night Answer. 9:00 AM call doctors office in Cleveland again, told doc can't be reached but will call back. 10:30 AM call doctor's office in Cleveland again, am told that I should have been called an hour ago by the home nurse who is on the way to our house. She should have already been there already as it is only a forty minute drive.

11:30 AM put in call to Home care company asking when ETA of nurse is, am promised a call back. Nurse calls, says she'll be here about 1:00PM. She has to locate a babysitter first.

Nurse comes and assesses situation with catheter. She doesn't think it's displaced. Then she looks at it again and thinks it is. Calls family doc and asks that an anesthesiologist read the x-rays of her neck from Monday night. She leaves. 2:30 PM, we call doc's office and ask if the films have been read yet. Are told that they have been, and although they can't tell for sure we should go on the assumption that the catheter has moved. Must be tended to as quickly as possible as it could cause nerve damage. Ask doc to call the Walk In Clinic and order pain meds IM. He says he will do so immediately. We get in the car and go to the clinic, stopping at the bank to draw out cash for tomorrow's rocket run to Cleveland. We use the cell phone to make appt with pain doc in Cleveland while enroute to clinic.

3:00PM, arrive at the Walk In Clinic for pain shot. Doc hasn't called yet. Clinic calls Doc and gets order. Now clinic must send out for drugs as narcs aren't kept on premises.

4:30 PM Patty finally gets a pain shot. Now we have to get home, pack bags, and get ready to drive the three hundred miles to Cleveland tomorrow. If all those medical professionals could have pulled their collective thumbs out of their butts long enough to CALL BACK when promised, we could have gone down today, and back tomorrow. Now Patty has to endure an extra day of pain, and an extra day of possible nerve damage. And I must take yet another personal day at work.

And, each phone call I had to explain what a tunnelled epidural catheter was, and each phone call I had to explain what RSD was, and each time I had to tell the whole story of the fall and ambulance trip. Everyone has all info on computer, and charts, and no desire to read or use those tools.

Well, haven't had good sleep in several nights, gotta get up and drive tomorrow, three hundred miles. Should go to bed.

Thanks, I feel better. Had to shout this out of my system. Sometimes I wonder how any of our systems work, they've gotten so large, so clumsy.

Sorry that it had nothing to do with the band. Now that I'm over being mad, I'd like to just sit down, forget about being macho for a moment and just cry until I dehydrated.

G'night.

Hi Ryan,

What terrible things that are happening to you and Patti. I really feel for you and am praying for you as well. It seems like bad luck is circulating around the world like a plague. Hope 2005 improves for everyone. Teresa

Sheesh!!! I just now read this thread and I am so sorry Patti is back in the hosp. I'm sending prayers and good wishes to you both.

Aw, Ryan, I'm so sorry. I hear such pain in your "voice". I know MRSA is the bane of health care provider's existance; I hope so strongly that she doesn't have it and that it's "just" a run of the mill infection that can be treated with antibiotics.

I'll keep you guys in my thoughts and hope for a quick and joyful homecoming.

(((((((Ryan))))))). I hadn't read the rest of this, either. I'm really sorry Patti is having problems again. Please know that I'll be keeping you both in my prayers.

Well, she's really sad about how the new year is starting off, that's for sure. But she'll be coming home monday or tuesday. I'll be there with her bright and early Monday morning. I'll have to leave by 4AM to arrive at 9.

She will be minus one of her pain controlling devices, so we'll see what comes next.

Thanks for all the well wishes. I'm off my pitty party now, and ready to take up the fight once again.

Ryan, or shall I say Rocky - ready to take up the fight again - my money is on you to come out a winner. I am so glad she gets to come home -- there is no place like home to rest and heal, plus you will be together. Love heals as much as being home does. I pray you will have safe travels and she will be feeling better soon. Take care of yourself -- of each other. You are a strong, loving man. We are all lucky to have you be part of our family. We are all pulling for you both. Happy January 2 -- glad to get the good news on Patty coming home!!!!!!

Ryan -

Hope Patty is home by now, and that all is well. Such small words, but the wishes for health and happiness for the both of you run to the core of my being.

**hugs**

What a miserable ordeal, Ryan. Let us know how Patty is feeling. And remember, you can always vent here. In fact, your written description of the ridiculous steps you took just to get your wife out of pain may prove useful if you need to take legal action against any of the medical professionals (I use that term loosely) for their negligence.

When you update us on Patty, let us know how you're doing, too. Thinking of you and wishing for the best.

She's home! She's in no pain 'cause they got her on enough Morphine to stun a Beluga Whale! But it is only temporary, until Dr. B in Cleveland can re-evaluate her position and make his next move. If it can be done, he will do it.

Yeah, I get kind of tired of some of the people in health care. But, they're not really bad people, they're just in the mindset of doing a job. If you don't maintain some impersonality in Health Care then your emotions will eat you alive, you'll burn out, and you'll be replaced by a real troglodyte. I get tired of the unreturned calls, people who don't listen to what you're saying, people who do procedure and common sense be damned.

Case in point: at the hospital they insisted on putting the little wrist band thingy on Patty's right arm. It's the right arm that has the RSD. Principal symptom of RSD is intractable pain of the entire limb, starting at the skin. I asked the lady "If her right arm was covered with third degree burns would you still insist on putting the band on it?" "NO" she replied. Patiently I said "When you have RSD that's what your skin feels like all the time. Like you had a third degree burn. Can't you please move the band to the left hand? Are you here to ease pain, or promote it?" I got through, and because she was a GOOD person and didn't want to add to someone's pain she moved the band to Patty's unaffected limb.

That was in the city. Here in the sticks we hire whoever applies, 'cause there ain't no competition. You get the cream with the dross. And you hire them both, because there are slots to fill, and a warm body is a warm body.

But I do agree on documentation. I may need it someday. I hope not. But if it ever does get too bad, they will find me a formidable enemy. Don't mess with my lady love.

Thanks all for your well wishes. I've been on the road for ten hours, and finished my house work for the day. Gonna go to bed soon.

glad she is home!

Hope both of you get a good night's rest tonight and tomorrow is a better day!

Glad you got her home!

Glad you're both home.