A Good Excuse This Time

Well, it's been almost a week again since I posted anything here again, but this time I have a really, really good excuse. No, the dog (which I don't have) didn't eat my homework. I was in the hospital.

I went to the emergency room on Sunday morning with severe abdominal cramps and another issue that I won't go into detail with here. The ER doctor suspected that I had colitis and a catscan seemed to confirm her suspicions. Several hours later, I was admitted to the hospital so they could observe me and make me drink four liters of something called "Go Lytely" in preparation for a colonoscopy the next morning.

The gastrointestinal doctor determined on Monday that I had ischemia in my colon. I wasn't in pain anymore by then, but he wanted to get an ultrasound of the veins between my chest and belly to make sure a blood clot didn't cause the ischemia. After another overnight stay in the hospital followed by an early morning ultrasound then lots of waiting for a cardiologist to read the report and look at the ultrasound video, I found out there was no blood clot. The gastrointestinal doctor believes that a new medication I started last week caused the ischemia.

I came home last night and slept very well in my own bed with no one coming in to check my blood pressure, to draw blood or to wake me up just to see if I was sleeping. Including the birth of my son four years ago, this was my second stay in the hospital. I can say with complete confidence that I don't ever want to stay in the hospital again. Unless maybe I'm having another baby, but I don't anticipate that anytime soon.

And after a lot of waiting around for people to perform a procedure or tell me the results of said procedure, I believe that the biggest problem with health care is not the lack of insurance coverage for a big number of people. It's the lack of money to hire enough medical personnel. If there were more nurses and doctors treating patients -- and reliable technology to facilitate their work -- then it wouldn't take so long to assess, diagnose and treat patients. My stay in the hospital should've required only one night in the hospital, not two. It would've cost all of us a lot less time and money.

But the best piece of news out of all of this is that I probably will be fine and have no major problems related to this as long as I avoid that particular medication. I do have to eat a low sodium diet for a while, but even though I love salt, I can handle it. I'd rather not go through that pain again or spend another night in the hospital.