Ricky update

Ricky's appointment was at 1. Dropped Misty off at day care and then headed up there. Got there a little early so he could do a chest x-ray. Because Misty wasn't with us, I was able to go in for the chest x-ray and see it when it popped up on the computer. Even I could see the infiltrates in that lower left lobe. :(

Once in clinic, he was measured and weighed... He gained 1.5 kilos and is now officially 5 feet tall! (How's that for mixing metric and English systems?) Yay! That's after 3 years of hardly growing at all.

His oxygen sats were down to 94... Not too bad, but bad for him. He did spirometry and his lung function was down from the 80s into the 70s. He did manage to hork up some sputum during the spirometry, which will be good to test and see what he's growing. Oh, and the labs from yesterday were all okay, though the hemoglobin A1C and a few others haven't come back yet.

His doc was not in today, so the doc we did see, with whom we are familiar, confirmed that he again has lower left lobe pneumonia. She decided to go with oral Rifampin, which Ricky had in July, and Prednisone for the inflammation. We are increasing his treatments too. We go back next Thursday, and if he's not better, he's going to be admitted.

I'm glad he's not being admitted (yet) but I'm also apprehensive. I hope he gets better. But Prednisone is really scary. When I am on it for asthma, it makes ME bitchy and cranky and gain weight and have bizarre dreams. Ricky hasn't been on it in a few years but the last time he was, he had behavioral isses. And he's bipolar! Gotta keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best!

He's back to school tomorrow as long as he's doing better. Tomorrow are picture retakes too. I also told him I'm going to have the teacher keep him out of PE.

Ricky went to bed tonight complaining of still having a tight chest, even though he had just done all of his treatments. I really, really hope these meds work.

Went and picked up the last of the meds I got refilled for all of us. I refilled everything possible at the end of the month. One, a psych med, was STILL not approved by the doctor, so I had to call up and get the on-call psychiatrist to approve it.

We'll see what tomorrow brings! (Hopefully a Medi-Cal card in the mail... That would give me a sigh of relief, that's for sure.)