Today was the second time we've been back to Mayo Clinic since we were discharged Tuesday. Irrigating the wound with antibiotic has turned out to be more trouble than we expected. Three times a day we are suppose to "install" the antibiotic gentamicin through the catheter, let it sit for 30 minutes, and then drain it back out. The problem is the wound keeps leaking. After being stitched up, it was sealed airtight with a glue called Dermabond, but it just won't hold for long.
After leaving the hospital Karen had been going to the bathroom at least every hour or two, which not only meant a poor night's sleep and a zombie‑like Karen, but a lot of sitting and standing, and bending at the abdomen, which we believe to be the cause of the glue failure. The first of which was the day after being discharged. I called the next morning and they got us in by 9:30am. They peeled all the Dermabond off, put three new layers on, and sent us home with two more Dermabond applicators. This and a little New Skin got us through until last night when the whole thing started to peel off. Dermabond is only suppose to stick for 5 to 7 days, so at that point it's just doing what it's suppose to. We peeled off the glue and tried covering the wound with plastic wrap to see if that would hold the antibiotic in, but it didn't. So we called again this morning and once again they got us in right away.
The wound had started to pull apart again. The doctors say it's just the elasticity of the skin that's caused this and nothing to worry about. This time they took out all the old stitches and put in more much closer together and sealed it with Dermabond again. We're waiting 24 hours to resume the antibiotic irrigations. Hopefully it will hold up better this time around. Karen's finally starting to gain some normalcy as far as bathroom frequency goes, so that might help as well. She tried backing off the laxatives a couple days ago and got worried she was getting constipated, but right now she's only taking metamucil and things seem to be fairly regular. Her pain level has been pretty consistent, which is disappointing as we were hoping for that to have improved by now.
We have follow up appointments with both the surgeon and the palliative team next week. I expect things will have improved some by then. In the meantime we have home health nurses visiting a couple times a week to take Karen's blood pressure and check for fevers and such. She says it feels wasteful having someone come out to check on her, especially since these are things we could check ourselves, but I guess it's for the best.
