T
TJB1054
Guest
What is the name of your state? Virginia
My mother recently went into the hospital for surgery to repair spinal stenosis. She had chronic COPD and asthma and was steroid dependent. In a matter of 36 hours, she passed away from what they later discovered (through an autopsy) was pseudomonal pneumonia.
A couple of things to consider:
--Her temp spiked to 100 degrees just a few hours after surgery and her heart rate climbed consistently from 110 to as high as 150. By the following morning, at 8 a.m., her temp was 102 and her heart rate was still 130.
--She was coughing intermittently through the night.
--She had received prophylactic doses of cephazolin and vancomycin, but did not receive any antibiotics specifically for a gram-negative respiratory infection until 11 a.m. Then she received 500 mg of Levaquin, and not a generally accepted combination antimicrobial therapy for someone at a high risk of pseudomonal infection.
My question is, what burdens do her doctors bear in discovering such a virulent infection before it gets out of hand? Clearly, the infection went very quickly, but they never did give her the proper treatment.
My mother recently went into the hospital for surgery to repair spinal stenosis. She had chronic COPD and asthma and was steroid dependent. In a matter of 36 hours, she passed away from what they later discovered (through an autopsy) was pseudomonal pneumonia.
A couple of things to consider:
--Her temp spiked to 100 degrees just a few hours after surgery and her heart rate climbed consistently from 110 to as high as 150. By the following morning, at 8 a.m., her temp was 102 and her heart rate was still 130.
--She was coughing intermittently through the night.
--She had received prophylactic doses of cephazolin and vancomycin, but did not receive any antibiotics specifically for a gram-negative respiratory infection until 11 a.m. Then she received 500 mg of Levaquin, and not a generally accepted combination antimicrobial therapy for someone at a high risk of pseudomonal infection.
My question is, what burdens do her doctors bear in discovering such a virulent infection before it gets out of hand? Clearly, the infection went very quickly, but they never did give her the proper treatment.