There’s one thing that I forgot to say when we were at the KU Med Emergency Room the other night and other times. I have noticed that I am known entirely by Neurological portion of the hospital as “Darren”, the “guy who pulled out the EEG leads from the inside of his head”.
Author: Darren Long
A blog about me, my meds, my brain surgeries, my hospital stays, my doctor visits, my life... la la la...
Emergency Room
Sunday night, Sherry was removing the gauze from the left side of my head where the “wound dehiscence” (picture from November 28) was covered. When the gauze was removed, it pulled the scab out of it. Not a pretty sight. This was a bit before 10 o’clock and we decided that I should to go to the emergency room. If I do, we had instructions to go all the way to the KU Med to make sure that I am taken care by people that know of my situation.
So, got to the hospital and checked in at about 10:45. About 1:45, we were told that we were next and had 30 seconds till the room was ready. Just then a trauma came in and took that room. My 30 seconds were gone! Whatever, we’ll wait. Then we were finally led back to a room at 2:40 where I had three different doctors come in at separate times and I flashed them the hole in my head. They each looked, stepped back and said that they needed to wait for the of the Neurosurgeon’s team that in the hospital at the time to come take a look at the hole in my head.
About 5:45, the Neurosurgeon’s team member showed up to take a look at the hole. He was throwing around ideas of things that may have to be done, such as stitches or taking me back into the operating room. Eh… He wasn’t for sure what he should do. So, he took a picture of the hole in head with his phone and sent it to the main neurological surgeon’s phone and he called him at home. The main surgeon basically just said to keep it clean and change the dressing twice a day because he’s thinking it’s going to heal itself from the inside out. Well, this is exactly what we were doing all this time.
So, we spent ALL this time at the hospital and were just told to keep doing what we were already doing. Did a prescription for an antibiotic, which happened to be the exact same one I was on before and had just run out of. I guess sitting around all night at the hospital just to get a refill of that was the about all I got.
I finally did get appointments set up on Monday. I see the Neurosurgeon on Wednesday this week, have my MRI on the 30th and see my Neurologist on the 3rd. That’s where I’m at right now. Need to cut these dang hospital bands off my wrist again. I’m getting a pretty good collection of those.
Thanksgiving
I’ve been wearing this Star Wars winter hat to cover my head while I go outside to protect my head. One reason is because after I had these staples removed, I have a small scab on my left side above the ear. The lady that cut the staples out told me to watch that and be careful. If the scab does happen to come off, don’t worry about it unless stuff starts oozing out. If that happens, go to the ER. Oh, great.
So…. You want to guess what happens when I pulled off my hat this morning? Sherry tells me, “uh, that scab is gone and it looks nasty. But, it’s not oozing!”
Thank God for no ooze. She got the Peroxide out and started putting it on. She told me to go to the bathroom to look at it myself. Honey, I can’t anything in a mirror with this thing above my ear. I finally told her to take a picture and let me see it that way. Looking at the picture, I can just about see the other wall through the hole. 😉
CAUTION: You may not want to look at this if you are eating.
The Staples Are Gone.
The staples are out of the head! Little painful, but just mainly the pain was from the staples on the sides in front of my ears as shown below. Took a little while to pull them all out, but they’re all gone. Didn’t do the MRI like I thought I was going to be doing today. I was told the doc would contact me about a meeting a MRI sometime soon.
“What are you doing?”
I’ve been asked this a few times, so I thought I’d update everyone as to my current standings.
1. Where are you at now?
Last Friday (11/15), I came home with the 125+ staples in my head.
2. What’s next?
Tuesday (11/26) I am going back to KU Med to get these staples removed. That should be interesting.
3. What have I been doing while spending all this time at home?
NOTHING!
4. What did the doctors tell me to do when I get home?
NOTHING! Relax and take it easy.
The next thing that will be happening after the removal of the staples: in January sometime is the next two surgeries. The first of the two is to slice and fold over a portion of the skull covering the left hemisphere. Then a larger EEG type map placed directly to my brain just on that side. This is to find precisely where the damage is located at. After the EEG map is placed onto the brain, the doctors want me to have another (I’m guessing) 3-4 seizures.
Once I have these seizures, I can have my third surgery. This will be the official cutting of the bad area out from my brain. All of this is done at one hospital stay.
One thing I learned from the last time I was in the hospital: the surgeon told me that my left hemisphere is significantly smaller than the right hemisphere. This is because of the 30 years of seizures. The doctors just kind of shake their heads and wonder how I’m functioning so well as I have all my life.
The Catalpa Chronicles 