Dad Update from David

This is an email update from David:

Dad seemed pretty well when we went to visit him last night. He has settled into the sub-ICU and is comfortable. As has been the case in the past, he is entering a stage where he is more wakeful and generally more alert. His overall lucidity tends to fluctuate – in particular, he almost always has questions for me about Mom when I go to see him. Initially, I would have to remind him that Mom was no longer with us and that didn’t always seem to register. Now, a gentle reminder is generally all that is necessary to kind of bring him back to the present.



On his last stay at Hoag (in Dec.) this was the stage in his recovery that he had some really WEIRD hallucinations. He is in a condition where he drifts in and out of sleep very frequently and it seems that whatever is on TV tends to mix with his own dream patterns and distant memories to create a very unusual tapestry of thought… I will be hoping that we can avoid much of that this time around. When he has somebody to visit with he tends to slowly hone in on the present and can once again carry a reasonable conversation.



Otherwise, he continues on the antibiotics and the chest tube continues to drain a significant amount of fluid from his chest cavity. He told me that his breathing is similar to how one’s head feels when they have a cold – it will alternate between very stuffy and mostly clear. The nurse confirmed that this should be expected to continue for a bit longer. All in all, he is continuing to make positive progress but the progress is, and will probably continue to be, tediously slow.