WRONG! At twelve days into this visit, I was hoping to see some improvement across the board. Instead I've been plagued by shortness of breath and a low O2 saturation (%SpO2) for the past several days.
My body is used to dealing with my O2 levels hanging out in the low 90's on room air. In all honesty, I don't really start to notice a difference in my breathing until I start hitting #'s in the mid-80's. Well, for the past few days I've been monitoring my O2 saturation levels a bit more closely because I would find myself out of breath with any form of exertion, and in some cases, even while talking.
To my chagrin, I found out that my #'s were staying in the 80's most of the time, barely reading in the low 90's, even with supplemental O2. Since that's kind of out of the ordinary for me, I ever so nicely asked my doc to figure out what was going on. (Actually, given my temperament of late, it would probably be more accurate to say I asked "Dr. Y., what the hell is going on?"
So today, Day 12, I went and had another CXR (chest x-ray). According to my nurse practitioner, I essentially had shown no improvement on my x-ray over the past two weeks and that I am still showing a lot of "junk in my trunk."
Also, it seems as if my body is not enjoying the lovely doses of Vancomycin that I've been receiving. With most antibiotics, doctors will typically monitor the peak and trough of the medicine in your bloodstream. My first trough level came back high (27.9, I believe) and it was thought that it may have been a fluke, or a bad sample. Either way, we skipped the next dose to allow my blood serum levels to return to normal. Today, upon re-check, my trough level was 31. With two high trough readings and a slightly out-of-sorts BUN (blood-urea-nitrogen level) the Drs. decided to change my dosing, by lowering the amount of Vancomycin that I receive (2 grams --> 1250 mg) and changing the timing (q 8 --> q 12 hrs).
Along with that, the evil little drug, Prednisone, decided to make a suprise appearance in my medicine cup this afternoon. I am NONE too happy about starting Prednisone as I hate. Hate. HATE. the way it makes me feel. But I'll survive.
Fair warning to all of my friends, family, co-workers, and assorted blog readers, I am laying all blame for any antics that ensue over the next few weeks on the drugs. I will not be able to accept responsibility for being very un-Brandi like, at least until I kick the Prednisone.
Without much else to report on, I want to leave you with an invite to Cystic Life, a great social networking service for CF patients by CF patients that has been in the works for a while now. Cystic Life was the brainchild of Ronnie (of RunSickBoyRun fame). It's where all the *cool kids* hang out. =)
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