Sunday, September 11th, Day 84 Update

Hey there,

Maria unfortunately ended up on the bad end of Tori's sleep cycle again... Tori sleep very erratically Saturday night and when she was up she displayed the same painful grimaces and arm stiffening behavior. Maria ended up having to order Dilaudid for Tori very early this morning which of course knocked her totally out until 1:00pm or so...

When I arrived at the PCMC we immediately gave Tori a hair washing while she was still somewhat under medication. Her arms can be moved very easily when she is in this condition so therapy was done on Tori as well. Tori's rehabilitation doctor Teresa was also summoned to examine Tori's extremely stiffened and twisted inward left arm and shoulder. She immediately began working Tori's shoulder blade to get her into a more natural and comfortable position and it really helped!! Tori was very relaxed afterward and without any medication she went into a deep sleep. We wondered if her shoulder and arm were the reasons for her pain but we discovered they were not when Tori woke up again. Even with her shoulder and arm relaxed the grimacing and wincing continues... She is fine when she has a Valium in her of course but we still must figure out what the issue is in her stomach. She generated alot of Bilious again today and it was dark green in color. The constant changing of the bile color and volume clearly indicate some form of stomach issue.

Tori's vitals again stayed great throughout the day. She maintained a 94-98% blood oxygen level at minimal oxygen level intake and there were a few times today when she was so relaxed it startled us. At one point I watched as her heart rate went from 85, which is really resting for her, all the way down to 68!! Her breathes per minute also dropped to 9 during this same time so I quickly called in a nurse. There was really NO issue, Tori was just very solidly resting. Since we watch Tori's vitals so closely it did give us a little scare though...

Tori's pneumonia seems to be steadily improving with each passing day. She continues to cough less and less and her Phlegm is the correct white and more saliva like texture as normal. It appears that Tori's strength is going to get her past yet another pneumonia!!

Without any of the GI team here we really didn't get any questions answered today in regards to Tori's stomach issues. We did test for Pancreatitis and the result was negative. Just one more thing ruled out I guess. Tomorrow I will request another stomach x-ray and perhaps an MRI on that same area. Someone, anyone, should eventually something amiss in that region...

Tori is sleeping very solidly as I am typing this without any medication so I'm probably benefiting again from Maria's previous long night with Tori. Sorry Maria... We are hoping to get more answers tomorrow when everyone has returned.

Thanks again and good night!!

-Tim