What A Day!
Woke up in the middle of the night and I was all sweaty, chilled and coughing up a storm. Took my temperature, it was 101.2 and I had pain where my lungs are and when I would breath, I could hear myself wheezing. I immediately got my rescue inhaler and took 2 puffs and some Tylenol. I got out my oxygen tank out because I was told that it contains 100% oxygen and my concentrator is about 85%. About an hour later, my temp dropped to 99.3 and the wheezing was not so bad. I took some cough syrup to help with the cough and that did nothing. I took the oxygen tank back to my bedroom and set my alarm clock for 7:00AM-4 hours. The oxygen tank lasts for 4 hours. I woke up at 7:00AM and my temp went back up to 100.3. My doctor's office opens at 8:30AM and I was the first call of the day. I was told to be there at 3:00PM and was instructed to get a chest x-ray first. Thank goodness that the care practice that my doctor is associated with has their own imaging & x-ray center and they can get simple x-ray results to my doctor within a 1/2 of an hour. The x-ray tech took 2 x-rays and wanted to redo one and I knew that this was not a good sign. I then went on to my doctor's office where I was greeted by the lab tech who wanted blood tests. When I got in to see my doctor he placed the pulse oximeter on my finger and my room air was down to 88% and my oxygen air was at 92% so my doctor increased my oxygen to 4LPM, which is double what I have been on and he then told me the chest x-ray was still positive for pneumonia and he started writing prescriptions. I have to go back on prednisone for 6 days, Azithromycin for 10 days, and cough syrup with codeine and he told me that he wanted me to get a nebulizer and he would call my medical supply company and get that set up. Since I can't get into the pulmonary specialist until the 20th, my PCP is ordering a chest CT. I am so very concerned about the condition of my lungs and also my immune system. I can't shake this infection and I am not very happy with all of this, but I am going to follow doctor's orders and take my medication and breathing treatments, I don't want to have to go back to the hospital. Thank goodness that I got my groceries yesterday, perhaps I over did it, I had to take my oxygen off to carry in the groceries. My Mother uses a walker and is not able to carry groceries. I am going to have to get some help with getting groceries and bathing, so I am going to have to search the web for a home health agency. My doctor has asked me to make sure that my bedroom is free of dust, so I am going to call a neighbor and see if she can help me achieve this, if not then I will have to get home health to do this for me. I apologize if you are tired of hearing about my ongoing problems with pneumonia, but it feels good to rant about it on here.
Hope you're cooling off this weekend!
