Mom's update

CT scan was completed at noon today. Hopefully we can get some much needed answers from it.

Elizabeth was NPO (no food/water) for the scan, but the NPO has been lifted, so no further procedures are planned for today, anyway.

As of last night, the bacterial cultures were still negative. Not good news when we were hoping this was simply an infection.

We have no results yet from pathology. They were sent a sample from the needle fluid drainage/biopsy on Friday. Since we are dealing in the real world where people don't really work over the weekend, we are two days behind in the cells being examined. Hopefully they have some time today to get to it.

We have no real explanations about what the CT really showed on Tuesday (or Thursday during biopsy, or today YET), so there is nothing to report on that front.

THIS IS WHAT WE DO KNOW:
Elizabeth had large amounts of fluid collecting both above and below the diaphragm on her right side. There was so much fluid underneath (pretty sure it wasn't inside the lung) her right lung that it couldn't expand... which caused the coughing. It was also irritating her diaphragm, which caused the refferred pain to her shoulder (just as you said, Lisa!) --yes, that is where that pain was coming from, and it's gone now (YAY!). The fluid has been drained (and is still draining a little since a drainage tube was left in on Friday). The amount of drainage continues to decrease daily.

WE STILL HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IS CAUSING IT.

I can tell you what we hope is NOT causing it... and that's more cancer. Anything but that. And if it has to be that, just let it be something that can be treated.

Mom is just a wee bit tired of the hospital and the beeping IV pumps. Please forgive the tone of this particular post. I am just so completely fed up with this whole "lifestyle" that I would so rather be rid of. Really, washing your three sets of clothes and Elizabeth's wardrobe of nighties for the third time in a week in the hospital washers is a drag. And yet, lest we forget, there are families facing so much worse right now that it's hard to have a real good pity party! *smile*

Please just keep Elizabeth and her doctors in your prayers. We really just need some divine guidance over here... some miraculous healing would be welcome, too, but we will take whatever we can get!! I'm still hoping that maybe the cultures were started on defective agar and that all of this is just an infection... HAH! Well... just anything but more cancer, okay?