It was another great day! Bill was asleep when I got there and they said he had stayed up all night again. But, today it was sunny and I opened the blinds and turned the TV on. Usually when he's sleeping, I leave the TV off and it's been so cloudy it didn't matter if the blinds were open or not. Last night was the first night someone closed the blinds.

He was put on CPAP a little after 8 and at 10:45 we tried trach collar again. He did really good and Dr. Sheikh came in then and was pleased that he was trying again. He said we would shoot for 6 hours but would take whatever he could do. And, when I left at 4:15, he was still on it, his sat was 100% and hadn't had any problems at all. The only time he started coughing I asked if he wanted to be suctioned and he said yes. The suction process is really awful to watch at times and I won't describe it, but he was better after that and went to sleep again, of course.

Therapy came in at noon and instead of just doing some exercises, they actually moved him to the recliner! They had to re-arrange the room to move the chair to the other side, but it was accomplished. He wasn't too happy about it and I told him he only had to do it for an hour. And, he again went to sleep and 3 hours later, his nurse came back in to put him back to bed! 

Dr. Edwards was thrilled to see him sitting up, but he was not pleased that his urine still has not cleared up. Maybe, just maybe, he'll get Dr. Greenberger back in. There has got to be a bleed somewhere that gets filtered through the kidneys into the bladder. He also had them remove the ART line since it had been in 8 days and they don't like to leave them much longer.

We did get some exciting news today. Earlier in the week, or maybe last week, Dr. Threlkeld said that someone sent him about 100 test kits of a process this person developed to check for antibodies in patients of the virus who had recovered. I don't know how many patients he checked, but he's only had 1 negative test. And, on the local news this morning, it was announced that the FDA has approved Baptist hospital in Memphis to give plasma with the antibodies to sick patients to see if it helps them develop their own antibodies! As far as I know they are the only hospital doing this. So, it you see something on the news about this and they are interviewing Dr. Stephen Threlkeld, just know that he is Bill's infectious disease doctor. He was almost giddy with excitement today and said that he had been in the lab grabbing plasma for a patient at 11 last night.

The only real downfall of the day was that Dr. Sheikh again mentioned going back to Restorative Care. Dr. Threlkeld was there when he did and I said that would be a problem. They both looked at me and I told them that with the no visitor policy on the 4th floor, Bill would not do well without me. Dr. Threlkeld immediately agreed and said maybe it was time to evaluate some exceptions. I told him that was fine with me, but if they make exceptions for one...and he agreed with that. So, I don't know what will happen. And with his bladder and swelling problems, Dr. Edwards may just nix any move at all. I talked to Bernice with the palliative care team and she said she only knew of one exception made and that was for a patient's birthday. So, we'll see what happens.

That's it for today. It was a good one and maybe it tired Bill enough that he will sleep tonight instead of watching TV! I'll let you know!