Friday, February 1, 2008

Despite the fact that Mark had a bad night due to a lot of pain, today was another good day. Not exactly a 9+, but more like a 7. His knees were very sore from the PT which is to be expected. He was a little cranky about doing more today. I bribed him with a lunch of lasagna and meatballs and dessert of tiramisu, which were leftover from a dinner we had a Fisher House last night. He thoroughly enjoyed it all. He had already had his speech therapy, a shower, and a nap before lunch, so off we went.

We received the results of his bone scans and X-rays. The bone scans showed the beginning of some hyper ossification in his shoulders and knees. This happens with a brain injury and is an excess growth of bone and calcium similar to arthritis. They are going to give him a medication for the next three months to help prevent it from increasing. The X-rays showed that his pelvis has healed so they can begin weight bearing exercises. His back is healing as well, but he will have to continue wearing the back brace for the next two to four months. There are still one or two thoracic vertebrae that are not completely healed and they do not want anything to jeopordize the nerves. He isn't happy about that, but he'll deal with it, because he has to.

The other development is that they have decided to serial cast his legs. The doctor in charge of the program is much more in favor of that than the braces. He believes that they will get results faster and with very little pain. Seeing the results that were achieved with his arm, I am also convinced that this would be better. He will still get the same physical therapy even with the cast since they do not cast the foot. This will also allow the sore on his heel to heal. They will start the first leg (his left) on Monday.

Since they were cleared for weight bearing, he was able to be put on a tilt table today. This one was quite a bit different than the one that was used at Walter Reed. He was able to put weight on his legs even though they were bent at the knees. He did very well. At the same time, they put electrodes on his left arm and they stimulated it to open and close his hand. He did make some remark about being the six million dollar man. It gave him "pins and needles" in his fingers but it worked well.

After all of this, he was ready for reading, a short nap and dinner. Then he just finally fell asleep. A full day without a doubt.