On Wednesday, Oct 7 we took my dad to the emergency room where we found out he had acute appendicitis. When they went in to do the surgery they had to open his whole abdomen to find the ruptured appendix, and found it rotted in two pieces. Immediately after surgery he was in a lot of pain and spent a few days drowsy and trying to eat, and hooked to an IV with antibiotics (Pipera Collin and tazobactam). It was awful to see him in so much pain, and I’ve had so much anxiety consistently monitoring his vitals signs in the hospital because it feels like the nurses are barely around. His scar, being very large, started to show a little redness and some pus on Friday and Saturday but nothing major, and he continued his antibiotics. Over the days he started to act confused in some instances but people kept telling me it’s the paid meds because his bloodwork shows no sign of infection and he has no fever. The only thing keeping him from going home at that point was his ileus.
Yesterday, on Sunday, I noticed he looked significantly worse than before. He was experiencing severe pelvic pain and was sweating from it, but the doctors told him to keep taking down liquids even though he said he couldn’t. He was squeezing my hand so hard and I realized he couldn’t take it anymore and asked the doctor to please have a CT scan to make sure there was no abscess. They finally ordered one, and right before the scan he vomited a bunch of watery liquid (including some of the contrast). The scan showed ileus (which we knew he had) but also abdominal distention. They put the nasal tube from his nose down his throat which he hated, and watching that process was terrible for me because he kept choking and spitting up. Immediately 500ml of liquid came out; later that night he finally had bowel movements (and a lot of them at that — mostly liquid but also some stool).
Today (Monday), they took him off the tube and put him on another type of antibiotics (vancomycin) in addition for his scar infection, which they haven’t told me is worse but I guess they are just trying something new? Today he tells me his stomach feels better than yesterday (obviously, it’s insane how much fluid came out). However; he has been sitting next to me all day sleeping; when he wakes up he looks confused, and I don’t know why but it’s freaking me out. I guess what I want to know is whether or not the sleeping is a good or bad sign — no one will really tell me here. I realize it could be the massive amount of pain meds they’re giving him but I really just need some reassurance that he is doing okay. His WBC went from 2.8 to 3.9, but they say even though it increased its still a normal range. Is there anything else we can be doing to help him recover? It was an open appendectomy so I realize it’s a big surgery. It has now been 4.5 days after the surgery, we are still in the hospital (not ICU); I want to make sure we are on the right track and not missing anything. I love my dad very much and want the best for him. Looking for similar experiences or advice, thank you!!!
