On July 27th Becky was admitted to a local hospital in Louisville, KY for the fourth time since the end of March. Diagnosis: Acute pain related to Pancreatitis & Autoimmune Hepatitis.
Despite being on a PCA (Patient Controlled Analgesia) Pump, which allows her to obtain 1mg of Diladid every 15minutes for pain Becky has yet to receive relief. The pain is due to her disease process known as “Autoimmune Hepatitis” which is an inflammation of the liver that occurs when immune cells mistake the liver’s normal cells for harmful invaders and attack them! Basically – her body is attacking her liver and slowly killing it. The doctors recently think that she may also have autoimmune pancreatitis. Which is the same disease process – only her body is attacking her pancreas as well.
She has a variety of different doctors trying to figure out what is going on, but at this time there is nothing that can be done. A liver transplant has been discussed – but she falls too short of the liver transplant requirements. They have discussed pain management options – including putting a rod into her spine which should help block the nerves to her liver through vibration. (That was a little too extreme for us because it does nothing to help her liver…this leads to my next post…)
Despite being on a PCA (Patient Controlled Analgesia) Pump, which allows her to obtain 1mg of Diladid every 15minutes for pain Becky has yet to receive relief. The pain is due to her disease process known as “Autoimmune Hepatitis” which is an inflammation of the liver that occurs when immune cells mistake the liver’s normal cells for harmful invaders and attack them! Basically – her body is attacking her liver and slowly killing it. The doctors recently think that she may also have autoimmune pancreatitis. Which is the same disease process – only her body is attacking her pancreas as well.
She has a variety of different doctors trying to figure out what is going on, but at this time there is nothing that can be done. A liver transplant has been discussed – but she falls too short of the liver transplant requirements. They have discussed pain management options – including putting a rod into her spine which should help block the nerves to her liver through vibration. (That was a little too extreme for us because it does nothing to help her liver…this leads to my next post…)
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