Mom

Yesterday, Friday, Jan. 15th.
I had been at work about 1/2 hr.  I was giving a bath.  The phone rang in the health center and the day CNA answered.  It was the nursing home.  She came and got me and I went to the phone.
The nurse said:  "Carol, your mom’s oxygen sats are in the low 60’s.  We are sending your mom to the ER."  I said:  "I can’t leave until I can get my shift covered.  Call my daughter."
I got off the phone and looked at the charge nurse and said:  "I gotta go.  Mom is in distress."  So I left.

First off, the nursing home social worker did not change mom’s full code status to do not recessitate/do not transfer from 3.5 weeks ago.  So the nurses at the nursing home decided to send her to ER.  They didn’t call her doctor either.  Which makes me mad.  They were to call her doctor before they called the ambulance.  She gets to ER and the doctor that was on was from Madison and he only works in ER once a month.  He didn’t know mom from Adam.  So he treats her aggressively, which she didn’t want.  The ER doctor calls mom’s doctor and tells him what’s going on.  In the meaning time, my daughter and I arrive at the hosp. and we have no idea what’s going on.

My first question to the ER doc was:  "why didn’t the nursing home call her doctor?"  He didn’t know.  Then I wanted to know why they called the ambulance when her order read:  DNR/DNT.  He didn’t know why they did that either.  Then I asked to talk to Hospice.  They came and that’s when we finally found out that the nursing home social worker hadn’t done her job.  It was never changed on mom’s chart from 3.5 wks. ago.

Tomorrow they will send her back to the nursing home with orders that read:  Hospice on the front of the chart.

Mom is dying.  I’m sad and happy all at the same time.  Sad, because my mom will be gone.  Happy that she doesn’t have to live like this anymore.  COPD and CHF are terrible diseases.  COPD especially.  Because you basically suffocate because you can’t breathe.

My daughter just called.  I need to get off of here and respond to her questions on mom’s obituary that we are writing.