and is off to a chaotic start. Sandi is back in Medical City Dallas Hospital for her third round of chemotherapy. I won't take you through how the sequence of things has changed several times this afternoon. It doesn't matter because everything we were told planning wise when she was finally admitted at 11 am this morning and through out the day is out the window and has been blown away up into Oklahoma at this point.
The current plan is now that she started the first chemotherapy drug at six tonight. This first drug should finish sometime before midnight.
At some point tomorrow morning, they will do a blood transfusion into her. How much? We have been told wildly different amounts so we have to wait to actually find out. I suspect this will be determined after they see how she is tonight and what they get when they again pull the blood at 4am. She is definitely anemic again at this point and was early this morning.
At some point tomorrow, they will heavily sedate her and move her radiology where they will do a lumbar puncture and inject a chemotherapy drug directly into her spinal column. We are told this is a routine procedure during the third round of chemotherapy and is done so that the cancer does not retreat into her spinal column and go to her brain.
As of today, the plan is she comes home late Thursday. We have also been told that assuming the pet scan agrees, it is almost time to start harvesting stem cells. This is way earlier than we understood before. It also has become a huge hassle far beyond what it already was because Wal-Mart will only pay her Aetna insurance claims/benefits if she goes to one of three "Mayo Cancer Centers." They are located out in Scottsdale, Ariz., Jacksonville, Fla., and Rochester, Minn. The fact that I am permanently disabled and medically unable to fly, the fact we have two special needs boys, the fact we have no resources, etc. does not matter as no exceptions are made. Supposedly they will pay for her and one family member to travel and stay at the Mayo location to receive treatment. How that all works, we don't yet know. If, for example, they pay by reimbursement to the patient after the patient has paid for plane tickets, it won't work as we have no credit cards. You don't have credit cards when you are dead broke, have no job, and have no credit.
So, how this is all going to work is something that is seriously up in the air right now. Hopefully, as the week progresses, things will start to shake out and will work out. But, this is another stressor we did not need and an added complication as she has no business flying anywhere for anything.
Unfortunately, it seems like we have no choice in the matter.
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4 comments:
Really sorry you two are having to endure all this. I hope the chaos resolves itself in your favor.
Given the choice, I would choose Scottsdale. Jacksonville is a bit farther (I think), but also has a decent climate--however, it's about to be hurricane season there. Scottsdale will be fairly moderate right now and on until June. That's a dry heat.
But you probably already know all this. Wow, now that insurance runs the show, things are always so much more difficult. *sigh* Used to be that your doctors ran the treatment show, but now they are told what they can and can't do by a bean counter.
I think maybe it's good to get started sooner rather than later, though. Will keep you in heavy rotation on our (personal) prayer list.
Thanks, Bill. I keep yelling enough already but so far.....
Jacksonville is the choice, Shalanna only because Sandi does have some relatives in Florida so there is a small chance they could come help her. None of her extended family lives in either Arizona or Minnesota. Since I can't go with her, she needs to be somewhere here this a chance that some family/friends could make it.
I just really hate this. I already knew there was not much I could if it was here because of my worsening health and all and I am very frustrated over that. Now I can't even sit in a damn room with her while she goes through it because somebody played with numbers. Drives me nuts.
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