Topic: Prayers for a friend

[Monk Vasyl]

Randy is seriously ill.  His symptoms have been rapid breathing, high heart rate, low blood oxygen.  He has been treated with massive IV fluids and antibiotics.  They put in a central line catheter last night too.   
 
The sepsis is coming from his small intestines.  Blood PH is acidic, thus the rapid breathing and rapid heartbeat.  Kidney’s are functioning minimally.
 
A morning CT scan today showed that he has pneumatosis intestinalis, which refers to gas cysts in the bowel wall.  This could be from either blocked blood flow or from germs producing air.  The docs say that the blocked blood flow is probably not what is happening and is the latter. 
 
Randy is on a ventilator this evening.  The plan is to let the machine breath for him.  That will allow his body to be sedated, given pain meds and rest from all the rapid breathing.  The hope is that the infection (being aggressively treated with antibiotics) can recede and his intestines can heal. 
 
If that does not happen, surgery will be an option. 

[LizaSymonenko]

Ohhhh....your friends sounds very ill!   

May the Lord have mercy on Randy, alleviate his pain and grant him a speedy and complete recovery!

Lord, have mercy!
Lord, have mercy!
Lord, have mercy!

[Heorhij]

+ Lord, have mercy!

[quietmorning]

Lord have mercy!!!

[biro]

Lord, have mercy.

[Monk Vasyl]

More news:  They had begun hemodialysis on Randy.  Randy’s kidneys were not functioning. So this new twist is definitely needed to cleanse the blood of all the toxins building up.

[mike]

Lord, have mercy!

[Aindriú]

Lord, have mercy.

[Cyprian1975]

Lord, have mercy!

[LizaSymonenko]

Lord, have mercy!

[Monk Vasyl]

Here's another update on Randy:

Randy is still not well.  They did some hemodialysis last night which helped out with some of the toxins in his blood. 
 
He will have another CT  scan today at 1 PM and the docs will compare with yesterday’s CT to see if the bowel problem can be localized or is more diffuse.  If it’s localized that can be a better scenario than more diffuse involvement in determining need for/possibility of surgery. 
 
Randy’s sister, Linda is coming later today/evening. 
 
The docs say that this whole thing doesn’t look good.  Randy is very sick.

[LizaSymonenko]

Thank You for the update.

Praying....

[Monk Vasyl]

Thanks, Liza.  It really doesn't look good at this time.  I'm also praying to St. John Maximovitch.  Vladyka John has never failed to help.

[LizaSymonenko]

I'll join You....

[Monk Vasyl]

I'll join You....

Bless you, Liza.

[SolEX01]

Lord have Mercy.

[Monk Vasyl]

Here's the latest:

Linda (Randy’s sister) arrived in SF this evening. 

Randy had a second CT scan this afternoon.  The results are promising.
There were no air pockets evident in the intestinal wall in this CT.  Thus
the docs tell them that this is no longer a surgical issue to be fixed via
surgery.  That is such a relief to hear.  Yet they also tell them that Randy
is not out of the woods yet.  He is still critically ill.  The CT did show
that there is still major inflammation in the intestine.  They will continue
to treat him with lots of antibiotics and fluid.  Many of his bodily
indicators are trending to the side of improving, i.e. white blood count is
down from where it was on Monday.  He has had a fever today being treated
with Tylenol and ice packs under arms.  One good thing is that he is resting
much much better than yesterday and last night.  The breathing machine is
allowing him to rest and allow his body to direct the energy to healing the
inflamed intestine.

When Linda arrived this evening he opened his eyes.  What a great thing to see!

Bless you all for your prayers.

[Monk Vasyl]

Thursday upate

Randy today was some improved.  Heart rate has come down but still remains high and has more reduction to come.  Blood pressure is at normal levels but that is being artificially sustained with medication.   Breathing is much reduced to normal levels.  A fever that he had since Wednesday has come down too.  Kidney’s still are completely shut down……no output at all.  That remains a major stumbling block in improving his ultimate recovery.  Tomorrow they will install a PICC line to alleviate changing other IV lines every 3-4 days.  That will make administering medications and fluids easier.  Another round of dialysis will happen (maybe tomorrow) when they fell he can tolerate  it better. 
 
Randy is VERY heavily sedated.  The moments of lucidity are fleeting.  He is indeed trending toward improvement , every day.  They do feel that he has “turned a corner”.  This will be a day by day assessment and his recovery will take a long time.  One doctor (who was quite blunt) particularly said today that this will be a very long haul.  Additionally the doc said make no mistake, Randy is very very sick.  He is still critically ill.  He is better than when he came in.

[biro]

Lord, have mercy.

[LizaSymonenko]

May the Lord have mercy on Randy!

...continuing praying....

Please keep us updated.

(PS.  Is he Orthodox?  If so, I will submit his name for commemoration during Divine Liturgy Sunday.)

[stashko]

Molitve.....
Gospode Pomiluj....Amin Amin
Gospode Daj Lecenje Dusi i Telo...Amin Amin

[Monk Vasyl]

No, he is not Orthodox.

[Monk Vasyl]

Thanks for continual prayers.  Here's the latest I received:

Friday update:  Today seemed to be a good day for Randy.  Medically he is still improving a little bit each day.  Still no urine output, yet no dialysis today.  Dialysis may happen again (in the next day or so) when he is able to sustain his blood pressure on his own without help from medication (a vasoconstrictor called Levophed).  They attempted to wean him off the Levophed today but without a huge success.  They will try again tomorrow. 
 
Last night they began to give him TPN (total parenteral nutrition), a nutritional formula that contains nutrients such as salts, glucose, amino acids, lipids and added vitamins. 
 
Randy has been on a heavy sedative called Propofol.  It happens to be heavy in lipids or fat content.  The large influx of lipids caused his triglycerides to increase and cause a bit of pancreatitis.  So today they switched him over to another sedative called Versed.
 
One of his doctors came in during the day (the surgeon) and spoke with us.  Seems that he has had some pretty severe inflammation of his small intestines….The source of which hasn’t been found. 
 
So all in all, he’s having a little progress each day. 
 
Near the end of the day, before Linda left for the day another doc came in.  During the discussion we were VERY surprised to hear him say that they may try to wean Randy off of the ventilator in the next day or two and see how he does.  If that is successful he won’t need the heavy sedation….his blood pressure will be more able to sustain itself independently, and then dialysis can be done to remove the blood toxins and then the kidneys can begin to function again.

[Monk Vasyl]

Here's the latest I got on Randy:

"They had performed a colostomy on Randy trying to find and pinpoint the source of the infection in his belly.  They took some stool samples and tissue samples to culture and see what grows.  Hopefully by doing that they can use a very specific antibiotic instead of the broad spectrum drugs they are currently using.
 
He was pretty out of it day.  Due to the colostomy Randy was pretty heavily sedated today so we had hardly any interaction with him.  Oh well, maybe tomorrow.   
 
During the night they were able to wean Randy off of the Levophed completely (the vasoconstrictor).  Now he is maintaining his blood pressure on his own.  This will allow them now to give him dialysis.  They were planning that for this evening after we left. 
 
They will indeed attempt to wean him off the ventilator in the next day or two.  That will be a major accomplishment.  We hope fervently for that one!"

[LizaSymonenko]

Here's the latest I got on Randy:

"They had performed a colostomy on Randy trying to find and pinpoint the source of the infection in his belly.  They took some stool samples and tissue samples to culture and see what grows.  Hopefully by doing that they can use a very specific antibiotic instead of the broad spectrum drugs they are currently using.
 
He was pretty out of it day.  Due to the colostomy Randy was pretty heavily sedated today so we had hardly any interaction with him.  Oh well, maybe tomorrow.   
 
During the night they were able to wean Randy off of the Levophed completely (the vasoconstrictor).  Now he is maintaining his blood pressure on his own.  This will allow them now to give him dialysis.  They were planning that for this evening after we left. 
 
They will indeed attempt to wean him off the ventilator in the next day or two.  That will be a major accomplishment.  We hope fervently for that one!"

Господи помилуй!
Lord, have mercy!

....praying that Randy has a complete recovery!

[Monk Vasyl]

Here's the latest...time for serious prayers:

Randy was essentially unchanged today.  He continues to be on the ventilator and his kidneys are not functioning.  However he is totally off of the vasoconstrictor Levophed.  Also this afternoon his sedation Versed was turned off.  He has not awakened yet from that however.  It could be up to two or three days to wake up. 
 

[LizaSymonenko]

Thank you for the update.

Lord, have mercy.

[Papist]

Lord, have mercy.

[Monk Vasyl]

I think Randy is Episcopalian.

Here's the latest I received:

One doc said that Randy has reached a “plateau” of sorts.

Two days ago he was totally weaned from the vasoconstrictor (Levophed) and
he is maintaining his blood pressure just fine on his own.
Yesterday the sedative was turned off.  Unlike the Propofol, Versed is
longer acting and has a lingering effect.  So today one doc said that it
could linger up to 48 hours.  And with his kidneys not functioning and the
BUN (a measure of the amount of nitrogen in the blood in the form of urea,
and a measurement of renal function. Urea is a substance secreted by the
liver, and removed from the blood by the kidneys) level has a tendency to
keep him unconscious too.

They preformed dialysis again today.  He was tolerating it well when we left
the hospital.

This afternoon when the dialysis was to begin, a nurse brought in two
machines.  She began hooking up hoses and electrical cords, setting up
bottles, etc.  The machine began to alarm (loudly).  With all this hubbub
Randy became more and more agitated.  He was moving his head back and forth
and lifting his arms.  His breathing rate increased.  It was obvious that he
was not liking what he was seeing and hearing.  And all of this was just the
set up of the machinery.  He had not been plugged in with his blood yet.
The nurse finally did give him a mild sedative (Ativan) which helped him to
calm down a bit.

[quietmorning]

Lord have mercy!! Praying. . .continuing.

[PeterTheAleut]

Thread locked temporarily for split.

[PeterTheAleut]

Rafa999's advice to have an ACOE priest give sacraments to this friend and those posts replying to this advice have been moved to Orthodox-Other Christian Discussion.

http://www.orthodoxchristianity.net/forum/index.php?topic=31532.0


Please remember that the Prayer Forum is to be a place for prayer, not for giving advice. Thank you.