Three forward ... one back

Sorry for the delay in posting an update but I have been holding off pending the results of the latest CAT scan.
Poor Douglas has had a pretty distressing four days mainly as a result of the remains of his chest infection which seems to have settled in the top of his left lung. He has been coughing a lot and needing fairly frequent 'suction', all of which is both very tiring and quite distressing.
However the good news is that the CAT scan shows that the source of the infection (3 small areas) have been killed off so hopefully things will improve now.
The Docs have decided to be a bit more aggressive in their treatment and have agreed with Doug to do a bronchioscopy (spelling??) examination with focused suction on Friday this week to try to finally clear out all the gunge. This is so important 'cause there is no chance of downsizing or even removing his trachy until his chest is finally clear. So be warned ... Friday may not be the best day to visit (he gets a low level of sedation for the procedure so may be woozy). I'll post if the procedure is canceled for any reason.

Despite all this he has been keeping up with his walking exercises and has managed around 5 mtrs down in the gym with the help of their 'walky' machine. The physios have agreed a 5 point plan with him outlining goals and timescales - imagine that, all with a chest condition that would lay most of us flat on our backs and incapable!!! I honestly can't remember them off hand but he is really trying. One was a minimum of 2 hours per day sitting upright in a chair - the first of which he achieved to-day. By the end he was really finding it difficult to keep his head upright and was really glad to get back into bed.

To top it all off he was moved into a 4 bed ward a couple of days ago and, despite being a bit uncertain over it, has coped well so far. Being dispassionate - all the goings on are a good distraction I feel and they do try to match patient care requirements where possible so that all need around the same level of care activity.
Nothing to do with his arrival, but within around 4 hours, two of the other occupants were moved out which meant relative peace and quiet! Maybe it was something we said???? Mind you that won't last long I suspect.
He is now in Room C Ward 32.

He does like seeing his friends and hearing their chat even though he may be a bit tired and not very responsive so thanks to all the folk that have visited!! It looks like around 30 minutes max seems to be optimum at the moment.
Even though we haven't been able to rig up wireless broadband yet, Sheena and I do read out all the blog and Facebook posts to him and it's amazing just how expressive one eye can be!!

Iain