merry andrew is in the hospital

I believe we need a corgi or two to do some herding...

Peace and Love..

Yay he speaks!!!

Wonderful work, Deb! Great thought, too!

MA - Siddown and shut up!

<tugging respectfully at forelock>

Yaz'm, yaz'm, I'se a-settin'.

For those of you with a truly morbid curiosity and strong stomachs, here's the transcript of the Hospital Course as it appears appended to my discharge papers. I have corrected only the most egregious spelling and grammatical errors, everything else is verbatim. (These things are dictated by assumingly literate MDs, but transcribed by semi-literate orderlies.) Nurse Margo, this might mean something to you.

69 year old male with past medical history of Colon CA and Rt colectomy, been presented to the hospital ED 12/17 am with of SBQ loop obstruction kept NOP and NG inserted and observe overnight. Did not improve and been taken to OR on 12/17 and had Ex.Lap with Ida and SBR's small bowel resection and anastomsis'. Patient did tolerate the procedure well and had no intraoperative or acute complication. The patient been extubated and sent to Recovery room where he maintain good Vital with the exception of his low UOP. Patient transferred same night to the floor. At floor he ha some difficulty tolerating diet and pain initially and kept NPO and sips for some times until he was able to tolerate the diet and his UOP started to pick up more and more. He was seen by cardiology for his trachycardia(A-Fib) and increase in blood pressure and was placed on Metroprolol, Lisinopril and Amiodarone. Patient's diet been advanced and he was discharged in good and stable condition tolerating diet and pain.

So now you know everything. But I think there's a lot of b.s. in there, too. For one thing, I don't even know anybody named Ida.

Here's a question for you medico-oriented knowledgeable folks. Under Discharge Diagnosis on that same page it says this: s/p Ex.Lap, LDA, SBR. Anyone have the vaguest idea of what the hell that means? I have no clue.

Aside: thankgawd for insurance. Seaglass, as Verizon phone company retiree, carries me on her medical plan. I just picked up roughly sixty bucks worth of prescription drugs and it cost me $11 US and some loose change. Not bad.

Glad you are feeling better, Merry.
I used to be a medical transcriptionist way back when but I don't think that's who typed this. I don't know what trachycardia is (it doesn't exist) but tachycardia is rapid heartbeat. I don't know what or who Ida is, but SBR seems to mean small bowel resection. Lap could be short for laparoscopy. I used to type for about a dozen bone docs so the lingo is different. LDA? Sounds like a political party or religious faction. Seriously, your doctor should be able to explain the cryptic meaning of these.
Being in a hospital makes you appreciate real food, doesn't it?
Take things easy,
B

These are absolutely wonderful. I had to go get a wireless antenna to get my skycard broadband to work.

Atta girl Margo, you tell him. I stutter.

In many tongues dlowan, in many tongues.

Glad you liked them - they make me laugh so much.

Mr. Merry have you called the cardiologist and made an appointment yet?

Muy pronto pal.

Probably means external laparotomy - i.e., open up the gut; LDA likely relates to adhesions (lower duodenum??) - and SBR - as Bathsheba suggests, probably means small bowel resection (that's where the duodenum is).

So - they opened you up, found some adhesions on the wall of the duodenum in the small bowel, chopped them out and sewed you up again. You survived the op. without complications, but grizzled a bit when you went back to the ward!

Mind you - it may mean something else entirely. Murricans use funny words.

Hope you're about and chipper soon!

Happy Birthday and Happy New Year!

Peace out dude. Glad that you're home, self-catering and all.

Well, of course he did. It's a hospital, chrisake!

Not only b.s., Andrew. What the hell is you UOP, & your ......?

No, no! Please do not feel under any pressure to translate!
It's enough that it's all over & you're on the improve!

... with your sense of humour is intact, even!
Excellent work!

Thankee kindly for that translation, Miz Margo. No, despite the ubiquitous novelty of 'murricanisms, I think your take on it is spot on. And a very happy New Year to you, too.

Thanks, ehB. My only problem now is that I'm starting to run low on victuals and it's nowing out there. The walk to the local grocery is short; still, it's a walk.

Y'know, Rog, the interesting thing is that once I slowly started to get my appetite back, the food wasn't really half-bad. There was a delicious meat loaf one night, for example, and you could order your eggs any style at all. As with all hospital food, of course, the problem is always the blandness. No seasonings whatever. But, as an ex-G.I., I'm used to far worse crap than that.

msolga, I believe -- looking at the context -- that the UOP has something to do with blood pressure. In the begining, it was frighteningly high. They kept switching meds in my IV to try and bring it down and finally succeeded to some extent. I'm on oral meds for it now and feel OK. And, as for my sense of humour, it's what keeps me alive, I sometimes think. I had the doctors and nurses in stitches in the recovery room.