I just got off the phone with Regina in a Sears Kit House, who is still in Swedish Hospital in Seattle. She is in extremely serious medical trouble. She just fired the PA she had been assigned as a hospitalist after a nurse came in to ask if she had eaten anything. When Regina demanded standby equipment such as an epi-pen, paddles, and the like to rescue her when she inevitably reacted to whatever she was given to eat, the nurse said indicated that none of that would be brought and that Regina must just go ahead because, and I quote, "you signed a DNR". Regina, rightly in my eyes, regards this as being told to go ahead and die.
She is reacting to everything she tries to ingest, and it's been taking the form of an anaphylactic reaction. They finally put her on IV dextrose yesterday, but now she's even reacting badly to that. She has not been able to get any nutrition in a dozen days. She's been labeled a psych case and says she's being warehoused, nothing more. As she got off the phone just now, she and her husband were demanding to see a supervisor and were finally, maybe, getting some attention in some way.
They gave her benadryl IV yesterday to counteract the reactions she might have to a medication they'd given her, Versed. Turns out she has an inherited allergy to benadryl that takes the form of hyperexcitability.
She needs two things right away. She needs a good inflammation specialist somewhere in some Seattle hospital, whether that be in the university system or elsewhere, including Swedish, and she needs the most hard-assed lawyer (her exact words) in the city. She needs "big guns", and the only way she has to get them is us.
I beg you, please take this diary seriously, and please don't come in here to dis "help needed" diaries. This is part of being a community. Someone, I won't call them out, came into Aji's diary yesterday solely to disapprove of the call for help. Please don't do this. We have a friend here who is in danger of losing her life, and it doesn't seem like anyone in that hospital cares.
I've had a DNR, when I was on dialysis. It means "if I go down, don't bring me back". It does not, in any way, mean "don't try to prevent my going down in the first place".
Anybody know a good doc in Seattle that you can contact or share info on? Anyone know a kick-ass attorney? Please help. I can't get ahold of anyone I know in the U system until tomorrow, and the people I can get ahold of are nurses in renal specialties. Regina says she needs someone who can admit her. She is extremely concerned that, being as lucid and ambulatory as she is, she'll be labeled a psych case or turned away at the UW ER. From whst I understand, this wouldn't be a first for her.
Thanks for any assistance you can provide, or for any other suggestions you can offer. Thanks to everyone who responded to my sister Aji's diary yesterday. We are all Regina has.
She's really scared. I would be, in her place.
Thanks.
12:30 PM PT: For more medical and other info on Regina, see Aji's diary from yesterday.
Mon Jul 30, 2012 at 12:26 AM PT: Added at my Nimisenh Aji's suggestion:
The medical issues and the reasons for her need to transfer are made clear in last night's diary (see prior update for link). Please trust us when we say that she knows what the problems are, what will work, what she needs, and how best to make it happen. This is now a matter of saving her life, and she does not have time for anything other than what's outlined. Please respect this, and do not waste time questioning why X hasn't done Y, etc. And please, for the love of all that's holy, do not dismiss this as "anxiety' or something else. It isn't. The diary outlines what's KNOWN to be needed; please focus your energies on those items, as requested.
