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A Serious Issue

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A Serious Issue was Originally Posted on April 14, 2012 by

Yesterrday I went to Waikoloa to install a piece of equipment and to review my tax forms. While sitting in the car, I began to get a bit dizzy and a headache. This was not good!

A couple days ago I had a molar pulled and because I was not completely numb, I had the dentist give me another shot. After the surgery I was taking penicillin and a Vicodin. The doses were not very high, based upon my research and I tested the pain killer with 1/2 a dose the first time and found no side effects.

A day or so later I noticed a lowgrade headache and looked at my blood pressure. It was high, but my BP seems to vary a bit anyway. When I checked in on Friday morning it was higher yet. On my return from Waikoloa I checked it again. It was still higher.

I called my medical provider, Kaiser, and the after-hours nurse suggested I go right away to the emergency room. Having just bought lots of frozen food and not yet fed the dogs all day, I opted to go home first. I quickly fed and let them out as I changed into clean clothes. I was trying not to get too excited or raise my BP any higher. By now my systolic reading was 170!

Becase they may keep me for a while, I took the dogs and drove past the hospital, put them in a kennal at my friends house and got to the hospital. At the checkin at the ER my pressure was not 185. I was admitted and put in a gown and given my own cubicle (so to speak).

On the official testing machine I showed 188 or so, but my respose to the their questions was still, no, I have no chest paind, just a headache and a bit of pain in my neck.

I gave the doctor the history of the past few days and he gave me something to lower my BP. When it did not, he gave me something else; then a third medication that didn’t work. I was still in good spirits, but resisted the urge to ask if it was time yet to ask Doctor House to consult? This was probably not the time to make too many jokes, as they are concerned that I could have a stroke. I did comment that a stroke would probably ruin the rest of my day.

Finally, after briefly hitting a systolic reading of 200, it receded with the latest medicine he tried. Soon I was down to like 135 and probably headed lower. I have been down around 125 recently.

So, 4 hours after being admitted, I was let go and headed home. I have to admit to being tired and a bit blurry vision, but made it home. Being tired is partly based on the medicine but I think a lot of had to do with being wide awake the 4 hours I was in the ER. It seems the ER staff was intent upon discussing their contract (they are union) and where they hoped to be deployed if they want to move states.

Also there was a woman whose voice was very load and I could hear every word she spoke. I would think that being in an ER, it would be helpful to have it somewhat quieter so some of us could sleep. In my case every 15 minutes the BP machine came to life and squeezed the heck out of my arm; a lot tighter than the machines in the stores do.

The doctors guess was the last shot I got caused the problem. My guess was the pain killer because certain drugs have raised my BP before.

In the meantime I will have my regualr doctor adjust my medicines again although they may not need to do much. I just have to stay away from the big shot.

Without the dogs at home, I was able to get a bit of sleep. Starting at 2am when I got home, I slept 6 hours, then got up for the call to Kaiser to get the appointment for Monday, then back to bed from 9am to 2pm, did some email and then slept from 4pm to 4:30pm when the phone rang. I have ben up ever since :-) I still am a bit tired but am increasing my caffeine. Since the tooth extraction I have been eating very lightly, consuming water, soups and then very soft foods like pasta and rice.

I’m sure I was a bit weak and my sugar level was low also. yesterday I actually started eating more, stopping for an Arbys roast beef combo and then later a COSTCO hotdog and soda.

I’m not really hungry at the moment, but did manage to eat a few spoonfuls of Kona Coffee ice cream. The Meadow Gold version used 100% real Kona Coffee. If you are going to start eating after an illness, this is the product to start with :-)