Joye's Update 4/28/08

Well, they were right when they said everything was going to start today. First thing this morning he was put on C-pap and he breathed on that for about 4 hours. I then did his range of motion exercises that the physical therapists have "trained" me to do. Then they tried him on a trach collar which essentially is when they take the vent tube off his trach and put a little thing on their that just provides a little oxygen in the tube and he is to breath 100% on his own with no air being pushed in. He was able to do this for 10 minutes, which is really good. It's very hard to breath on your own when you can't feel yourself breathing. They then put him back on C-pap and he was able to continue on that for just a little while until he was too tired, so they put him back on the vent. Then the physical and occupational therapists came in and placed him in what they call the Cadillac chair. They lay the chair flat like a gurney and they slide him from his bed on to it. Then they slowly put the chair into a chair-like position. They monitor his blood pressure very closely throughout the exercise as it's very common for it to go up or down, and his rose as he was put into a sitting position. He was able to sit in the chair for 15 minutes and then they had to put him back in his bed because of the blood pressure issue. This is quite common, and they will just have to keep trying until they can get him sitting upright while keeping his blood pressure stable. It's all just going to take a while. My call to the Craig Hospital in Colorado was returned today as well. We are having Andrews medical records sent to them and we have involved his insurance case worker to see if a negotiation can take place with them and the hospital. So, please pray that all that works out so that we can get Andrew evaluated. We'll start over tomorrow with the same regimen and this will be the routine for a while with hopeful improvement. As always, we so appreciate all your posts and prayers and your birthday wishes. God bless you all. Joye