Post Transplant Week 5

I’d like to say these pictures are a joke....  but alas they’re not!  Ben is back in the hospital.  Yesterday we came in for his normal weekly scope to check for rejection and after the scope we headed over for his blood draws and our bi-weekly appointment with the transplant team.

Before the scope all of his vitals were normal, but by the time we got to our Dr. appointment he was spiking a temperature of 102.7!  I couldn’t believe it!!!  Not even 2 hours before it was fine.  All weekend he’d been having a splitting headache but otherwise felt fine.  No temp, and believe me it gets taken often.  They were attributing his headaches to his Prograf level being a little high. (Prograf=anti rejection med)  His level being high wasn’t alarming, he’s just absorbing really well and they can adjust his dose down.

Anyway a fever of 100.3 means being admitted to the hospital.  No matter what!  We know this, so the second it came back high I knew they would be admitting him.  They sent us to the ER because they didn’t have a bed available for direct admitting, but they wanted to get started right away on testing and finding the cause of the fever.  Now I was not thrilled about this because COVID19 has just started making an appearance in cases here in Ohio and I felt like the ER waiting room is a cesspool of germs.  Nevertheless we went there.  Luckily they took him back quite quickly. 

Security is pretty tight in the ER, so we had to go through the metal detector and I had to wear this lovely visitor badge. 

It didn’t take too long to have a room available up on the transplant floor and they moved us up there as soon as they could.  They immediately removed his central line and gave him an IJ line in his neck and started 4 types of IV antibiotics.  This is common procedure, thinking most often a fever is a sign of infection and the central lines are often the culprit.  They ran a Myriad of tests to try to find the source of possible infection or rejection.  The Jury is still out.  He feels fine and the fevers gone.  Hopefully its just a little speed bump in the road to recovery and it will be a short stay. Say a prayer please. 

At least he gets a private room.  There are shared rooms and private rooms on the transplant floor.  Patients with his type of transplant are a priority to have a private room because their immune system is so suppressed. 

Somehow... he still manages a smile.