U of C Day 21

Today has been a tough day for Leo. He's been feeling horrible all day. He is fatigued, nauseous, coughing, and towards the end of the day, started to get a fever. As he is still at risk for another seizure, the doctors are keeping a very close eye on him. Earlier today, they too out his PICC line as they feel it has been in too long and may be the cause of infection. They decided to keep the central line that is in his chest in as they need the IV access for his meds and transfusions. The problem is, since he already has an infection in his blood stream, there is a risk that the infection will affect the other line as well. So earlier in the day, the hospital had some of their best phlebotomists come by to try to get a couple IV's into Leo. He is a very difficult stick. If they were to take out his central line, they needed at least 2 IV's in his arms to administer his meds. They were unable to get any, so they left the central line in. Later in the evening, he got a fever and the doctors are very concerned. They are hoping just because he had one unit of platelets and 2 units of blood today is the reason he got the fever, but if they determine that is not the case and they cannot control the fever, they will have to remove his central line tonight. If they still cannot get IV's into his arms, they will put another central line in on his left side instead of his right. The risk with doing that is that his platelets count is so low right now, that he has an extremely high risk of bleeding. So as I type this, we don't know yet what the doctors will decide to do. I will be sure to update later in the evening as things develop.

Thanks so much to Larry for coming by today to donate platelets. I know it's a huge time commitment and Leo and I really appreciate it. Thanks also to Vanessa and Karl and Patrick for coming by to visit. Although Leo didn't have much energy to talk with you guys, I had fun just hanging out and talking. It was a huge stress reliever for me. Thanks so much for being great friends. I will post more tonight if anything develops.