So, Wednesday is when I went for that nice walk with Decker, even though I wasn't feeling great. Came home, passed out, woke up incredibly nauseous. Tried eating some lunch and I made dinner, though I was way too nauseous to eat.
At this point is where things started to go downhill. All of a sudden I start getting major stomach cramps and I am running to the washroom. We were trying to watch Godzilla, and in a 16 minute span of the movie, I had to pause the damn thing 13 times. 13 TIMES!!!! The pain was getting so intense and I couldn't get a handle on it, so we decided to take me into Emergency. Could be food poisoning or Pancreatitis - those were my first two thoughts. With vomiting and bile and liquid and cramps and incredibly intense pain - I didn't want to take any chances. PLUS - if it was angioedema, I am not allowed to stay home during an episode like this.
Okay so get to emergency - and it was close to end-of-shift for everyone who was on. This is not good.
Right away the one nurse goes - "Well did you try Imodium?" in a very rude and very condescending manner.
So instead of responding, or yelling at her, I just handed her my medical information on the piece of paper that I carry with me. Her response was "Oh". Then I explained that with possible underlying Hereditary Angioedema and C1 Esterase Inhibitor Deficiency, if I have any indication that it could escalate, then I have to be in the hospital because Epi Pens will not work. She looked a little deer-in-headlights and quickly took my vitals. Only problem was that all she wrote on my chart was 'diarrhea'. Awesome. This is now going to dictate how the rest of the staff treats me - which was total bs for the first 4 hours until shift change.
So... I get into the area they want me in, and there is only one washroom for the entire emergency room. I go four times before being called to go over my chart.
The nurse with the pink hair calls me in and is IMMEDIATELY condescending. I have to fight my way through that conversation. She starts asking about my allergies and what reactions I've had and is even condescending about THAT! "That's a rare allergy, are you sure it was from the medication?". And "how did you know it was pancreatitis for sure?"
"Yes I know it's rare. And my lipase was at 4556 the once and 1332 another time. Trust me." Then she just was angry and rude and I wanted to smack her.
Anyways, she asks for 'samples', but the washroom was in use, so I was told to go out into the main area and use the main washroom there. So there I am, in the main area washroom that EVERYONE uses, kneeling on the floor getting samples. Yep. Disgusting. Embarrassing.
I go back, hand in my samples, and sit down. The nurse with the pink hair takes the samples and proceeds to complain about me to a colleague. Right there. Apparently I didn't have 'enough' so she says: "yeah people come in complaining about diarrhea but never seem to have enough to give a sample".
She turns and I am there, getting an IV put in, staring (well glaring now), directly at her. I tell her to give me ten minutes until the cramping starts again and she'll have another.
I was going at regular intervals - usually in the main ER waiting room bathroom. By this point I have already lost about 5lbs and an incredible amount of fluids...
I go into the washroom - the actual one - and unfortunately start vomiting as well. By this point I can't even stand. I have to pull the 'pull for help' string in the washroom. At least 2 minutes pass as I hear the nurses ARGUE about who is going to go - then the nurse yells at me for having locked the door.
Are you effing kidding me?!?!? There is one washroom for everyone to use and I did not expect to be unable to effing walk! Do they not have a key?!? So I manage to unlock the door, she asks (rudely) what I need, I said that I just vomited and that I will need help getting back to my room.
So, who does she send in?! A male porter. (Yes there were female porters around). Luckily, he was great. He was very respectful and professional, but I seriously wanted to hit the nurse. So, he comes in and helps me finish, then wheels me back to my room and helps me onto the bed.
Still, at this point, I am going every 10-15 minutes. And I have lost all shame. Shaky, writhing in pain, cramping, continually going to the washroom, and so weak that I couldn't even speak anymore. When the doctor finally came in, my bf actually had to tell her most of my symptoms because I couldn't even speak to her. At first she was condescending too, and when I asked if they could check my lipase levels, she told me that people with pancreatitis don't get diarrhea. Now I'm ticked off. So I said "I have been hospitalized for pancreatitis SEVERAL times and I always have diarrhea. I don't know if it's pancreatitis, but don't tell me what my symptoms can and cannot be".
She was better after that.
Now - finally - thank goodness - was shift change. Get the nurse with the pink hair out of here. I could hear all of the nurses complain about how awful of a night it was, complaining about several patients (who were right there in the rooms). I usually have pretty great experiences at Rockyview, but this was so unprofessional I could not believe it. They should have either been sent home early or fired.
Anyways - I've gotta go again. Since I have an IV pole now, I can hobble by myself to the washroom. The bf had gone to call my parents anyways. But, the washroom is taken, so I start wheeling out to the main one, again. A nurse (a new one) starts running after me saying that I have to come back and she'd explain why. She said they were moving me and giving me a commode. Apparently, what SHOULD have happened the second I got there, with my symptoms and my history, is that I should have been isolated and given a room with an attached bathroom. They are keeping me overnight.
Now because that initially didn't happen, that room was taken by someone else. So they had to isolate a block in the ER for me and give me a commode - The Poop-Mobile. It's just a chair with a bucket, essentially, but meant that I no longer had to walk around every ten minutes hoping the bathroom would be available.
Thank god - new nurses. And OH MY GOD were they ever amazing. All of a sudden, they are kinder, they actually listen to my symptoms, to my medical history, and one nurse actually used to work in Internal Medicine, so she understood my history as well.
Unfortunately, they still couldn't do much for me. They gave me an anti-spasmodic, which didn't work, they gave me one dose of morphine, which then dropped my blood pressure too much and so they couldn't administer another dose, and the ondansetron helped a little, but not enough to alleviate symptoms.
Things slowed down around 4:30 am (when my parents had been there for about 2 hours). I was going less - but everything else was the same. I couldn't sleep - I was seated in a chair and kept having to use the commode (totally better than the batmobile). I needed help to and from and kept my gown open for easier access. I couldn't walk myself, I was so incredibly dehydrated, things were still not good.
The worst of it is that they STILL have no idea what's going on. Once it slowed down and the pain deemed manageable, they had to send me home. The GI at Rockyview is not my regular GI, and we all doubted that it had anything to do with my Pouchitis or Crohn's, so she thought it was unnecessary to see me or do another scope (since I JUST had one). They did cultures but they won't even get the results until later today. My lipase was just above normal, as was my white blood cell count, my hematocrit and hemoglobin and neutrophils. My neutrophils are always outta whack though. Still no fever but getting chills.
So, they sent me home around 8am or so.
Spent most of the day in bed.
I switched my antibiotics. The one I was on was called Doxycycline, and I got esophagitis once from it - so I thought, just in case it caused a massive gastric ulcer, I may as well change antibiotics.
I was also put on a new medication last week, and although Pancreatitis is unlikely from that medication, I am not taking it. It wasn't working anyways.
Then, because my pancreas is bothered (either from the meds or whatever bug I may have gotten), I am going to stay on soft foods/full fluids until the bile disappears.
I emailed MY GI doctor to see if he has any other advice. At this point, other than over night when I only got up three times, I am still going about every 45mins to an hour... All bile. Stomach cramping is still occurring, although less intense.
I will find out today if I had/have C-Diff or E-Coli or another bug.
The only issue with this is that if I DO have C-Diff, it's actually really contagious and I should be isolated. Though they really don't think that that is what I had. Perhaps food poisoning of some sort.
So here I am, at home, STILL really struggling, having NO clue what this is/was, still expelling bile frequently, and wishing I still had the Poop-Mobile beside my bed. Though it is much nicer to be at home in my own bed than in a hospital room in a stupid chair.
Again - I don't have many bad experiences at that hospital - which is why that Emergency Room is the one that I usually go to. But frankly that one specific nurse should absolutely be reprimanded, if not fired.
No, they couldn't do much for me. But I have underlying Angioedema. Episodes like that REQUIRE me to go into an Emergency Room. If that was cause by, or ended up causing, swelling of my intestinal walls and went up to my esophagus, I would be screwed. They are not allowed to give me an epi pen - since that doesn't work on angioedema - and, therefore, I would have to be immediately intubated.
There was no way in hell I was taking that chance at home. And I have been told - by several specialists - that I am not ALLOWED to take that chance. No matter how 'inconvenient' my hospital visit may seem to some nurses.
I'll be in bed all day. Well, in bed or in the bathroom.
Hopefully my GI has some advice for me. Or maybe it will just go away sometime this weekend....
Stupid week.
No comments:
Post a Comment