Over the past few days Dad made a lot of progress coming of the ventilator. Over Wednesday and Thursday, he did pretty well, staying exclusively in the mode on the vent that only gives a small amount of air pressure to help keep his breathing passages open. Today, they turned the ventilator off completely for most of the day. We were told that if he continued off the vent over tonight, he'd be done with it. Unfortunately though, this evening while we were not with him due to visitation hours being closed, he became very agitated and he was put back on the vent in pressure only mode.
Over this time Dad has been comfortable at times, in a lot of pain at times, feeling very anxious at times, breathing well at times, struggling to breathe at times, awake at times, and at times in a deep sleep due to sedation. Sometimes he seems cheerful and alert and shows a sense of humor. Other times he's in too much pain or too sedated to be himself. It's been a real roller coaster ride. Through all of this, he hasn't been able to talk to us due to his trach. He can communicate by mouthing words, but it's hard. Therefore, when he's struggling, it's hard to tell if it's due to pain in his back or somewhere else, or intense anxiety, or simply due to his inability to get enough air.
The setback tonight which resulted in him going back on the vent was a bummer. To complicate matters, his primary physician in the ICU, a pulmonologist, will be gone for a month starting tomorrow. Also, we're a little worried about how long we will be able to stay in the ICU. We've gotten some hints that the hospital is ready to move him along to a nursing home if we're there much longer. Yeah, nice. Nevertheless, we're trying to stay optimistic. Dad's a tough old man. He's been through worse.
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