Enlightenment at The Wound Clinic (Mon May 24, 1:30pm)

Several months ago mom was shopping and accidentally banged her shin against the sharp metal corner of an end rack in a store. She has such thin skin that it cut her, and since she takes Coumadin to keep her blood thin, it bled like mad. The sore has not healed in all this time. Her doc referred her to the "Advanced Wound Clinic" in Klamath Falls for treatment, and she has had one appointment a week for (I think) the past three weeks.

We went in this morning for another follow-up. The clinic is staffed with a very experienced RN, and they rotate the physicians from the Emergency Room through the clinic. Today (as well as one of her previous visits) the doc was Dr. Freid, who is the guy who admitted mom to the ER a month or so ago.

He checked the wound, and said that although there is no infection, he thinks that the reason it isn't healing is because she has very poor circulation in her extremities because her heart isn't pumping blood efficiently, especially through the smallest veins.

He gave her a local anaesthetic, and then did some work on the wound. (I'll spare you the cringe-worthy details.) While he was working, he asked her some questions about her general health, so I jumped in and told him all about the spells/seizures. After some discussion, the light bulb went on. He thinks that these spells have a very simple cause: her heart isn't pumping enough blood. He thinks that these spells happen when her heart rate slows down so much that not enough blood reaches her brain and consequently her brain can't maintain control over her body. MAN that makes so much sense. We already know that when she went into the ER a month or so ago, her heart rate got clear down to something like 27 beats per minute. He told her to lie down the next time it happens. I asked her a few days ago whether she has ever had any of these spells when she is lying down, and she said no, which supports his theory.

He said that the best thing to do to help her shin wound to heal is to get her heart working better, which will improve the circulation in her legs. She told him that she sees her cardiologist Dr. Kubac on Friday.

I am glad to have a plausible explanation for the spells, but at the same time it's kind of alarming because Bill and Jack and I have compared notes, and it appears to us that the spells are more frequent now than they were even two weeks ago. They are also more intense--instead of a momentary flicker of blankness in her expression, they are now ranging from clear disruptions of her speech to all-out shaking and collapse of her muscles.

This morning I saw one mild spell happen while we were sitting in the sun room, and she immediately said that it wasn't a spell and that she was just shivering. (It was only 75 degrees after all.) Then a few minutes later she had a big one where her arms shook, and her head lolled back against the chair, and she was completely out of it for five seconds. Her half-full coffee cup was balanced on her knee, and she wasn't holding onto it, and oddly enough it stayed there without tipping over. (Pretty good trick.) She had several spells on our way into town, but no nausea. I don't think she had any while we were in the grocery store, and I don't think she had any on our way back out to Rocky Point. She had a small lunch, and she is napping right now.