Ruth vs Adenovirus

 I’m writing now that there’s more definitive news about her latest fevers and bloody diarrhea/vomiting. The news can be interpreted as good or bad depending how you look at it. Turns out, her biopsy of her colon was negative for acute GVHD (graft-versus-host disease). This would have been bad. You don’t want rejection, which would have required more immunosuppressive, and thus lead to more infections. The biopsy was positive instead for Adenovirus. So we have an answer. This virus typically makes little babies and kids pretty sick. You can think of Ruth, though, as  having a baby immune system still, and her recent immunosuppressives don’t help. She has the virus in her colon, blood stream, and now in her lungs. Maybe her brain too because her thinking has been slowed. She sleeps a lot now, most of the time. The medical team finally started an antiviral medicine, which has so-so effectiveness. They may have to cut down on immunosuppressive medicines to help her beat the virus. They also started iv nutrition because she hasn’t really eaten much since mid-September, just bites every day and some boost. They wanted to give iv nutrition weeks ago, but she kept getting her central lines infected as you know, so didn’t have a route to get iv nutrition until a new central line was placed. Last night her blood sugar dropped to 29 just before they hung the first bag of iv nutrition! And I didn’t hear about it until I read it in a chart note an hour ago. I’ve been pleading with her doc for days to get iv nutrition, which is quite frustrating. 

Her battle with Adenovirus will be a tough one and can take weeks according to the infectious disease doctor. 

On the bright side, at least she doesn’t have BOTH adenovirus and gvhd. Treatment for each have opposite goals- and she’d be in  dire straights if that were the case. 

So please pray for her fight against this virus.  She’s pretty beat down from it. They’re moving her to a room with a lift now because she can’t sit up on her own. But they’re keeping her Mountain View. 

Visitors are welcome. Just please don’t bring any viruses. Ideally you’ve gotten your fall vaccines (Flu, COVID, +/- RSV). Just realize there may be not a lot of conversation from her. I just find myself sitting with her each day, watching her sleep…watching college football…updating Blogs.  

Roy 

Sleeping Beauty