Wednesday, February 24, 2016
Wednesday, October 28, 2015
In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made to the Vikki Auzenne Memorial Fund
(#3647050) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Vikki and Joe shared a commitment to supporting MIT
students and Joe has created this fund as a lasting memorial to Vikki.
Gifts may be made by check
or credit card.
Checks should be made
payable to MIT and mailed to:
Bonny
Kellermann ‘72
Director of
Memorial Gifts
600 Memorial
Drive, W98-500
Cambridge,
MA 02139
Credit card gifts can be
made using the following link: https://giving.mit.edu/givenow/vikki-auzenne.dyn
Feel free to contact Bonny
<bonnyk@mit.edu> or 617-253-9722 if you
have any questions about your memorial gift for Vikki.
In Loving Memory
Vikki Olson Auzenne
November 10, 1956 to
October 28, 2015
Heaven has a new angel. She made our world
a better place and she will be missed by all of us who knew her and loved her.
*******************************
In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made to the Vikki Auzenne Memorial Fund
(#3647050) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Vikki and Joe shared a commitment to supporting MIT
students and Joe has created this fund as a lasting memorial to Vikki.
Gifts may be made by check
or credit card.
Checks should be made
payable to MIT and mailed to:
Bonny
Kellermann ‘72
Director of
Memorial Gifts
600 Memorial
Drive, W98-500
Cambridge,
MA 02139
Credit card gifts can be
made using the following link: https://giving.mit.edu/givenow/vikki-auzenne.dyn
Feel free to contact Bonny
<bonnyk@mit.edu> or 617-253-9722 if you
have any questions about your memorial gift for Vikki.
Sunday, October 25, 2015
JUST WHEN IT SEEMED LIKE THINGS COULDN'T GET WORSE, REVISITED.....
Last night, the CODE BLUE alarms sounded....no pulse, no blood pressure. It took 15 minutes of CPR to restore her pulse. Nobody knows what caused the event. They are pulling out all the stops to treat her and try to figure out what is going. For now, there are only questions....no answers. When you add this new problem to her neurological issues, it is hard to find a good path to recovery for her.
I am not giving up on her, but I am beginning to think its going to take a minor miracle for her to overcome all of things that are going wrong....or maybe a couple of them.
Last night, the CODE BLUE alarms sounded....no pulse, no blood pressure. It took 15 minutes of CPR to restore her pulse. Nobody knows what caused the event. They are pulling out all the stops to treat her and try to figure out what is going. For now, there are only questions....no answers. When you add this new problem to her neurological issues, it is hard to find a good path to recovery for her.
I am not giving up on her, but I am beginning to think its going to take a minor miracle for her to overcome all of things that are going wrong....or maybe a couple of them.
Saturday, October 24, 2015
JUST WHEN IT SEEMED LIKE THINGS COULDN'T GET WORSE......
I got to the hospital this morning to find Vikki even sicker than yesterday. They did a CT of her abdomen last night and then decided to do a head CT (no one called to advise me). Today's problem list has gotten much more complicated and now includes: pancreatitis and pancreas damage with possible bleeding in the pancreas; colitis; blood clots in the kidneys and kidney damage; blood clots in the spleen and spleen damage; a possible stroke with blood clots in the brain and possible neurological damage……multiple infections……ICU delirium and disorientation…..possible blood clot in the heart. How on earth does a human being endure all of this and bounce back.
They have done an ultrasound of the blood vessels in her arms and legs looking for more clots. They have done a echo cardiogram. They are setting up to do a colonoscopy. And they are planning to do an MRI of her head for more detail.
No results yet. No diagnosis. No treatment plan.
I got to the hospital this morning to find Vikki even sicker than yesterday. They did a CT of her abdomen last night and then decided to do a head CT (no one called to advise me). Today's problem list has gotten much more complicated and now includes: pancreatitis and pancreas damage with possible bleeding in the pancreas; colitis; blood clots in the kidneys and kidney damage; blood clots in the spleen and spleen damage; a possible stroke with blood clots in the brain and possible neurological damage……multiple infections……ICU delirium and disorientation…..possible blood clot in the heart. How on earth does a human being endure all of this and bounce back.
They have done an ultrasound of the blood vessels in her arms and legs looking for more clots. They have done a echo cardiogram. They are setting up to do a colonoscopy. And they are planning to do an MRI of her head for more detail.
No results yet. No diagnosis. No treatment plan.
Friday, October 23, 2015
It's been about two weeks since the last update.....two weeks of little progress, more challenges and more setbacks. I haven't written much because I don't like sharing nothing but bad news.
Updates: On the positive side, Vikki is able to do pressure support trials for 4-6 hours daily. This says that the lungs are working pretty well and she can breathe with minimal support from the ventilator....but only for limited periods of time.
But, she is not making a lot of needed progress in her respiratory recovery. She has tried using the trach dome - just oxygen with no mechanical support - a couple of times in the past week or two. She has only been able to handle this for short periods of time. It's good that she can do this, but the short duration of each trial indicates she has a long way to go to get off the respirator.
Medically, she is struggling.
She has a pancreas infection, cause unknown. It is being treated but there is no good treatment for this. They are working on finding the right drugs. Sometimes they have to stop the tube feeding to let the pancreas rest. They believe she has lost of portion of her pancreas. They also believe there is some kind of fluid buildup around the pancreas that may need attention.
They are concerned that she may have some internal bleeding....probably minor, but enough that her hemoglobin has dropped several times to a level required a transfusion. They believe this may be associated with the pancreas infection. Interventional radiology was going to attempt to block off the bleeding area but decided they weren't sure they could find it and didn't want to risk an invasive procedure.
GI is believes that the fluid build up around her pancreas may actually be putting pressure on the area that was bleeding and this may be helping to control the bleeding. They don't want to drain the fluid because they are worried that may lead to more bleeding.
The only plan they can come up with is wait and monitor her for changes. I finally had a good talk with the GI attending. This is a major referral center for pancreas treatment, so she is in the best place possible for treatment. With that said, there is not much they feel they can do other than wait....and hope it gets better and not worse. They have told me that her type of problem could take months (yes, that's not a typo) to resolve itself.
Meanwhile, she is in a lot of abdominal pain. The pain has been limiting her ability to do all of the therapy activities that she should be doing to regain strength.
To add to her troubles, she now has some kind of colon infection. That just showed up this week. They are doing cultures to figure out what type of infection it is and how to treat it. They have stopped one of her anti-rejection drugs that could be causing this new infection. Now, they have to find a replacement for that. This is another wait and monitor issue. They have talked about doing a colonoscopy to take samples for testing, but they are worried that her colon is too inflamed and that they could possibly cause damage with the scope.
She has reverted back into her state of encephalopathy (the delirium) with all of these challenges. We can't tell what's going on...whether she just wants to block everything and everyone out or whether there is a clinical cause for this. Whatever is causing it, she has basically been totally withdrawn for the past three days. She will open her eyes when you speak to her, but she will not respond or acknowledge. She won't smile. She won't squeeze my hand. She won't write notes on her pad. There is no way to get any response of any kind from her. I tried playing Jimmy Buffett tunes yesterday....that didn't work. I am running out of ideas. And of course, this is another challenge for the therapy team as she won't cooperate with them.
So my life has become 10-12 hours of bedside sitting....talking to multiple doctors...trying to understand what's going on....and hoping for some kind of good news for a change. We had a big care conference with the attending docs from 4 different teams that are treating her. I am pretty confident she is getting the best care they can provide.
The thing I can't understand is why this is happening to my lovely, caring and compassionate wife. I can't think of anything she has done in her life to deserve this kind of crap being heaped upon her day after day after day. If there is a god, why is this happening to her...and why isn't he answering the prayers of all of her friends and relatives. What is this world has she done to deserve this and when is she going to get a break. I thought getting the new lungs would be the beginning of a new chapter in our life, but I did not expect that this chapter was going to be such a nightmare.
Updates: On the positive side, Vikki is able to do pressure support trials for 4-6 hours daily. This says that the lungs are working pretty well and she can breathe with minimal support from the ventilator....but only for limited periods of time.
But, she is not making a lot of needed progress in her respiratory recovery. She has tried using the trach dome - just oxygen with no mechanical support - a couple of times in the past week or two. She has only been able to handle this for short periods of time. It's good that she can do this, but the short duration of each trial indicates she has a long way to go to get off the respirator.
Medically, she is struggling.
She has a pancreas infection, cause unknown. It is being treated but there is no good treatment for this. They are working on finding the right drugs. Sometimes they have to stop the tube feeding to let the pancreas rest. They believe she has lost of portion of her pancreas. They also believe there is some kind of fluid buildup around the pancreas that may need attention.
They are concerned that she may have some internal bleeding....probably minor, but enough that her hemoglobin has dropped several times to a level required a transfusion. They believe this may be associated with the pancreas infection. Interventional radiology was going to attempt to block off the bleeding area but decided they weren't sure they could find it and didn't want to risk an invasive procedure.
GI is believes that the fluid build up around her pancreas may actually be putting pressure on the area that was bleeding and this may be helping to control the bleeding. They don't want to drain the fluid because they are worried that may lead to more bleeding.
The only plan they can come up with is wait and monitor her for changes. I finally had a good talk with the GI attending. This is a major referral center for pancreas treatment, so she is in the best place possible for treatment. With that said, there is not much they feel they can do other than wait....and hope it gets better and not worse. They have told me that her type of problem could take months (yes, that's not a typo) to resolve itself.
Meanwhile, she is in a lot of abdominal pain. The pain has been limiting her ability to do all of the therapy activities that she should be doing to regain strength.
To add to her troubles, she now has some kind of colon infection. That just showed up this week. They are doing cultures to figure out what type of infection it is and how to treat it. They have stopped one of her anti-rejection drugs that could be causing this new infection. Now, they have to find a replacement for that. This is another wait and monitor issue. They have talked about doing a colonoscopy to take samples for testing, but they are worried that her colon is too inflamed and that they could possibly cause damage with the scope.
She has reverted back into her state of encephalopathy (the delirium) with all of these challenges. We can't tell what's going on...whether she just wants to block everything and everyone out or whether there is a clinical cause for this. Whatever is causing it, she has basically been totally withdrawn for the past three days. She will open her eyes when you speak to her, but she will not respond or acknowledge. She won't smile. She won't squeeze my hand. She won't write notes on her pad. There is no way to get any response of any kind from her. I tried playing Jimmy Buffett tunes yesterday....that didn't work. I am running out of ideas. And of course, this is another challenge for the therapy team as she won't cooperate with them.
So my life has become 10-12 hours of bedside sitting....talking to multiple doctors...trying to understand what's going on....and hoping for some kind of good news for a change. We had a big care conference with the attending docs from 4 different teams that are treating her. I am pretty confident she is getting the best care they can provide.
The thing I can't understand is why this is happening to my lovely, caring and compassionate wife. I can't think of anything she has done in her life to deserve this kind of crap being heaped upon her day after day after day. If there is a god, why is this happening to her...and why isn't he answering the prayers of all of her friends and relatives. What is this world has she done to deserve this and when is she going to get a break. I thought getting the new lungs would be the beginning of a new chapter in our life, but I did not expect that this chapter was going to be such a nightmare.
Monday, October 12, 2015
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