Some thoughts on Ron's medical care

 I am watching a Chicago Fire marathon on TV.  

A lot of medical scenes.  It got me thinking.  After Ron's accident I felt like he had the best of medical care, that even a sultan or congressman couldn't have done better.  

And, overall, I felt he got really good care all the way down the line.  Exception: orthopedic surgeon who did his back, pain doctor.  But everyone else treated him well, respected my role, and did their best to keep Ron tip top.  

Notable: all the first responders up to the day he died.  Excellent care and compassion, kind to me.  Five stars to all of them.  

One doctor he had some time back did a lot of what I felt to be unnecessary testing and was not very good at diagnosing his neuropathy, I already talked about the other 2 didn't impress me, but all other doctors were great.  Notable: one hospital doctor when Ron was admitted with both anemia and blood clots.  Got Ron on clot busting drugs and a blood transfusion, a referral to a hematologist.  The hematologist NP was very compassionate.  Ron just wasn't interested in twice monthly checkups on that.  

Ron was not an easy case to treat and absolutely horrible about follow up.  I had a heck of a time even getting him to a neurologist for his seizures.  Blood pressure, he understood immediately and was very compliant with that but he was in major denial of the seizures.  

And let me tell you, Ron having a grand mal was one of the worst things I saw in my life.  But he couldn't see it; even a video wouldn't have been enough.  I could tell him it was awful and all but what really did it were the muscle aches, the bitten and bloody tongue, the severe nausea.  That finally "sold" him he had a serious condition.  

And I told him, again and again, you don't get this treated and get sick or die, it's on ME.  That also sold him because he didn't want to hurt me.  And he always bit his tongue, poor thing, then spitting blood into a bucket or towel (I always had a lot of towels in his room) with the fan running full blast, utterly miserable.  But he never had another seizure after he started the Keppra so let's give some props to the pharmacist.  

The day I got hired the pharmacist saw me in my uniform and asked about Ron, I told her.  She was taken aback.  Not really a line of work where you hear the patient has died, they just stop filing scripts.  

But at least now I think I have pretty much told everyone.  My aunt said I did a good job and very calm explaining he had died but I did get tired of saying it.  

Anyway that's it for now.