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Home Hemo Day 2 – Hemoglobin

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Today was my second night doing dialysis at home. Everything went pretty smoothly…no unsightly alarms today. I made sure I was well prepared with my prefilled saline syringes and my recirculator and such. I guess the only hiccup in treatment was when I forgot to draw up more than one bottle of heparin. I need at least 1 and 1/4 bottles but I only drew up 1. It didn’t matter though, because when the no heparin alarm woke me up I only had about an hour and 15 minutes left of treatment, and the heparin shuts itself off when there is an hour left anyways. I turned the heparin off completely and went back to sleep. When I had about 30 minutes left, I kept getting these silly “concentrate error” errors. What the heck? My acid jug was 1/4 full, and there was still bicart too…so what’s the deal? No sooner did I ask myself that question did I realize that I really needed to go to the washroom. I decided to just retransfuse, cap my needles, and hi-tail it to the bathroom.

I think I kind of lied above. Dialysis itself went well, but I didn’t sleep very well. I’m not sure why. I slept ok the night before, but not as well this time. After taking myself off, stripping my machine, cleaning up and preparing for my next dialysis, I went back to bed and just stayed there for about an hour and a half. I closed my eyes…but I didn’t sleep. Again, to be expected I guess.

I remembered to give myself my aranesp today to. 160 micrograms. Yes, a huge dose I know. Speaking of which, I got a bit of disappointing news on Monday. Remember operation hemofilter management, where I lost some of my blood because my circuit clotted? Well that happened on a Friday. On the following Monday, both Rose and myself thought it would be a good idea to check my hemoglobin. My hemoglobin dropped from like 103 to 90. It was pretty upsetting, especially considering the fact that previously, my hemoglobin was holding strong in the low 100s after my blood transfusion (I think that was in January). I guess we’ll just have to keep an eye on it.

Tonight is my dialysis day off. My dialysis days off are Monday nights and Friday Nights. I chose those 2 days because I work on Tuesday morning and also on Saturday mornings. I figure that since those are the two days where I have to get up and leave the house at a decent hour, perhaps I should take those two days off until I get into a steady and organized routine.

I emailed my online school and asked them about extending my course, which is what I’m going to do. I need a “medical note”, which shouldn’t be a problem. But I had to email them back to ask about a “medical note”. What is a medical note? Is that the same as a “doctor’s note”, or can my nurse Rose write it? Who knows.

Oh, I also finally got an appointment to see a plastic surgeon. I had mentioned this previously, but I want to get the scar on my stomach fixed. I have a huge scar from when I had to have colostomy surgery. If you haven’t read the post in question, it’s here: http://flowonlupus.blogspot.com/search/label/colostomy%20surgery%20part%202
In the last paragraph I talk about wanting to see a plastic surgeon to fix my scar. When I had staples in my stomach, they were removed too early, considering the fact that I’m on prednisone and don’t heal as quickly as others. When the staples were removed, the wound opened up almost immediately, and had to be packed with gauze every day in order for it to heal. The reult? A big ugly scar. I hope to get that fixed. My appointment is on May 8th. They said that it might not be covered, but I’m guessing/hoping that’s just a formality and they have to say that. I can’t imagine why it wouldn’t be covered by OHIP….it’s not like I’m asking for a boob job or something. I have a huge scar due to an error that was made through no fault of my own. I think it should be covered. I’ll discuss more when I speak to the surgeon. If and when the surgery is scheduled, I’ll post before pictures, then obviously after the surgery is done, after pictures.

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