Tuesday, December 13, 2011

(posted by Greg)

Monica got called today by the Cancer Agency. Her first Bev infusion is scheduled for tomorrow. We are glad that it is happening this quickly and hopeful that it will stop the tumour for a while and give her some relief from the symptoms. It is becoming more and more obvious that she is losing strength on her right side: she has a marked limp,her right foot drags a bit and she is not able to use her right hand for anything requiring strength.

The Cancer Agency had referred us to the local Home Care providers and we had our first visit from the nurse. She outlined what services are available to us when and if we need it. Basically, we would be able to  get 4 hours of nursing care per day (in chunks of time of our choice). The nurse is going to have an occupational therapist visit us to make recommendations as to how we can make sure our house is safe for Monica while she is walking and usable if she needs to use a wheelchair in the future. She is also going to have a physiotherapist see us. It may be that a brace on Monica's right foot would make it easier for her to walk and less likely to trip. The nurse was very nice and I must say that I am generally impressed with what our health care system can do when it works well (which is what seems to be happening for us!).

I continue to be impressed by Monica's attitude. While it bothers her to have the strength on her right side affect her mobility, she doesn't let it get her down. So far she continues to take it all in stride and to be able to find the humour in some of the situations: i.e. she laughed with us all when we referred to some decision as a "no brainer" and  ie. when visiting Opa tonight, her and Marley decided to take advantage of an empty wheelchair by the hospital door. It made me feel sad to see her using the wheelchair but when Marley started pushing her Monica let out a happy "Whee!"

Some news on the other medical fronts as well -Oma was released from the Langley Hospital today and returned to her care home - the social worker from the Richmond hospital called about Opa today so I think they will want to move him from the hospital soon (although he is not up to full speed yet and probably can't yet go back to the independent living section of the care home that he was in before his operation.)