Z/Web

Today was supposed to be our long-planned trip to the coast with Grandpa. Instead he’s in the hospital. Yesterday the home nurse was here to take a routine blood test and later I got a call to get him to emergency right away. Apparently his poor kidneys aren’t processing potasium correctly and there’s too much in his system, which can lead to heart failure. So I got him over there last night and he’s staying there for a few days so they can monitor him. He feels fine and is in good spirits — the potasium level showed no outward signs. It’s a pretty silly muck-up: I’ve had him on water pills since last summer because he was retaining too much fluid (he swelled to 144 lbs. at one point — he’s normally around 100 lbs.). Because water pills drain your fluids, they always proscribe them with potasium pills, to replenish your supply. But Grandpa’s kidney’s aren’t functioning as well as they used to do, so now the extra potasium’s too much. Yet, of course, no one mentioned this or caught this after his last hospital stay with kidney problems, so the last few weeks I’ve been faithfully giving him potasium pills every day! The idiot doctors noticed the potasium levels rising last week but didn’t say anything to me because the level wasn’t dangerous. If they had, I could have stopped giving him the pills and he probably would have been fine! Instead they waited until the level was too high and I had to rush him to the hospital. There they gave him some stuff to bring the potasium level down and now they want to watch him for a few days. And of course, we’re not giving him potasium pills any more. A big “Oops, someone should have noticed that” from the doctors. Nice.