Friday 28Feb

Happy Friday!

Today was absolutely PACKED, and it wasn't even a "real" day today. Brian is still in the evaluation stage of admission but it was busy busy. When I first got there this morning, Brian was not in his room and I had no idea where they were. I did expect this though since I knew he had a busy day and I can't get there super early since I have to take Lincoln to school. But not to worry, I met up with him when he was in speech therapy today.

Speech therapy has much more responsibility than I had originally thought. So we learned previously that they do actual speaking, but they also help with swallowing. At both Good Samaritan and the LTAC, the main focus for his speech therapists was swallowing. He cleared all food textures while at LTAC so that part of speech therapy is already done. What I didn't realize was a part of their role is cognition and memory. So they are going to help Brian with his aphasia but also help to determine the memory skills and potentially improve those (along side his neuropsychologist as well). I sat in and watched his speech therapy session today and was actually very impressed with how he did. She had him do a few different tests, but it was a lot of seeing a picture and saying what the picture was of (like a bed, a tree, a broom, and so on). 

He did some OT, PT and tests at Swedish before I got to the hospital today (and while I was alone in his room). In the time I was in his room I also met with his case manager and his dietitian. Brian also did a PT session while I was with him and I have been cleared by the PT for an on campus pass for Brian. This means that while I am with Brian he can go anywhere on the Craig hospital campus and he can either go with me walking or in his wheelchair. This is really nice because we can go and sit outside if he wants to, or go to their big cafeteria to eat our meals, or even just walk the halls if he is bored. 

All the tests he had this morning came back totally normal with one small exception. He has a very small blood clot in one of his calf muscles. This is super common with trauma patients because when you have a trauma your body starts to clot. He also was not really moving for weeks after the trauma. This is why Craig does the ultrasounds on the extremities for all admitted patients. Since the clot is below the knee, it will not interfere with any therapies, but it does still need to be treated. He started taking a blood thinner orally (he was already on one as an injection previously). The treatment starts out with a high-ish dose and then slowly the docs decrease it, and he will take it for awhile (definitely post discharge). This does delay the removal of the peg because they don't want any excess bleeding when they do that removal because it's a surgical procedure to remove it. The PA suggested having Brian do at least a week on the high dose of the blood thinner, and then we can talk more about the peg removal. That was a bit of a bummer because Brian wants to get that out. It isn't bugging him necessarily, he just doesn't want it anymore since he doesn't need it.

I think that is all for tonight. I am absolutely exhausted after this week and I plan to take a shower and then pass out! I look forward to many more exciting days to come and I am so happy we have made it to Craig! Even just in the first few days, it is so obvious that they all know exactly what they are doing here. 

🤍