Day +136: ICU Tonight

Sarah is in the Intensive Care Unit tonight. Her blood pressure spiked unexpectedly late this afternoon. We think it may have gone as high as 185/130. We are not sure as it was pretty hectic when the hospital staff finally got the vital sign equipment to register her blood pressure. The normal piece of equipment would not register a blood pressure, so they tried another just like it and it would not register a blood pressure. Sarah then yelled out that her head was "hurting really bad". They rolled in another piece of equipment and got multiple high blood pressure readings that dropped rather quickly, but leveled off around 150/115. At about the same time as the high blood pressure measurements, Susan noticed the red blood cell transfusion was pumping at a higher rate than it was supposed to be. The pump battery died and the nurse reset the pump rate wrong. The staff assured us the higher rate was too low to cause the headache or increased blood pressure, but we were skeptical.

At any rate, her blood pressure is normal now and she'll be monitored in ICU all day Tuesday. Sarah's blood pressure has been elevated since she began the chemotherapy, so she will likely go home on blood pressure medication. The CAT scan Sarah had to check her brain came back normal too. It was pretty scary for a little while today.

The good news today is her oxygen level is solidly good and her calcium is now at a normal level. Sarah's calcium has been low for a few days and she couldn't go home until it was normal. She will go home on calcium supplements too.

It looks like we will not go home until Wednesday at this point. Certainly Sarah needs to be in the hospital until she is stable.

We still feel good regarding Sarah's dropping WBC and feel confident she will be going home soon.

-Ben