salamz and thank you for your duas for my sister. I have been not around as much over last few weeks due to family commitments and then catching up with work.
My sister went through her first round of chemo and had serious reaction over the weekend and had been in ER and then Intensive Care. She had been having severe irreagular beats and fainting episodes which was either a direct result of the chemotherapy medicine or the cathedar (sp?) that had been inserted up from her arm to her heart to deliver the medicine.
Turns out that the doctors messed up. The tube (pick line or cathedar as they call it) that they had inserted was supposed to be close to the heart so when the medicine is administered it gets pumped throughout the body and thus the toxicity of the chemotherapy does not affect any single specific region adversely due to concetration of the chemicals.
That pick-line was inserted too far up to a point that it was actually “inside” her heart which everyone declined to believe. The doctors were calling on a Cardiologist do do a heart biopsy to figure out what was causing this, other concern was that maybe the toxicity of the the chemicals had that affect on her heart. Thank God that my sister is a doctor and convinced them to entertain the possibility that the pick-line was inserted too far up. The X-Ray that was done showed just that and they pulled the pick-tube 3 inches back.
My trust in doctors, HMOs and hospitals is declining day by day. If my sister was not a physician, right now they would have performed a heart biopsy on her. Atleast I am learning all medical terminology now.
She is doing much better now and has been back home for a few days. The battle against cancer is a long and tough one.
I appreciate all the kind words and duas and the emails.
Kami