Hospital - Day 11

Ed here, in Seattle. I decided to surprise Andre by driving back right after work. I managed to get here in 2.5 hrs.

Andre still has the usual complaints: fever, nausea, headaches, chills and GI issues. When I arrived, he had been told to take his anti-rejection, anti-GVHD drug--cyclosporine in solution form, orally. The hospital had run out of the IV form of cyclosporine which they had been infusing through his central line for 3 hrs/dose. They've been giving him cyclosporine slowly because they want to minimize the allergic reaction he gets from this drug. We figured that taking the cyclosporine orally might put his allergic reaction in dangerous territory. So we decided to clarify with the nurse who, in turn, asked the night-shift doctor on duty.

Half-an-hour later, a man came in Andre's room WITHOUT putting on the required isolation gear (the yellow coat, pale blue gloves, baby pink face mask). Instinctively, I yelled at the guy and told him to suit up. It turned out he was the doctor.

I was willing to forgive him that time and give him another chance for redemption. Once he was appropriately attired, he started asking Andre some questions regarding his allergies, his symptoms, etc.--basically everything that should be in his charts. This completely ticked me off because it seems he doesn't know anything about Andre and his condition. I very bluntly, with a clearly annoyed tone, asked if he had even read Andre's medical records. He said "no". If looks could kill, he would be dead by now. He must have noticed my irritation because he then started to do the routine "doctorly" things on Andre (checking his vitals, listening to his chest, examining his eyes, etc.) with an apologetic gesture. After that he left and said that Andre can just take the 7 ml solution form of cyclosporine slowly over a couple of hours.

Andre's first ml of the drug ended up getting puked out. So's the second ml. I asked them to just get Andre the capsule version and we'll try it. So far, we've downed 1 out of the 7 pills. Six more to go. Wish us luck.

P.S. He finished all 7 pills at midnight. I'm back in YVR.