recovery

I can always tell when it’s been too long since my last update because the volume of “How’s Jody?” email starts going up.

Status

For the past two weeks Jody has been recuperating at home. She sees a visiting nurse occasionally and has been getting physical and occupational therapy twice a week. Her strength and balance continue to improve. She goes for walks with friends, regularly walking down to our mailbox and back, a round trip of about 1/3 of a mile. Tomorrow she will begin outpatient therapy.

Jody is starting to be able to use a computer, though she finds it very tiring to sit in an upright chair for a long time and her typing ability is limited because she can’t feel the keys.

News flash: Jody is being released from rehab tomorrow (Wednesday) around 11:00am. We look forward to being home in the early afternoon. Jody will get a week or two of nursing care and therapy at home and then progress to outpatient therapy.

Her therapists are very concerned that Jody not put herself in a situation where she could fall. Her neck is not as strong as it will eventually be, her balance is not great, and her reflexes are poor to nonexistent. Balancing the risks against her desire to regain her independence is going to be an interesting challenge as she continues to improve.

Just walking around the house all day (no more wheelchair to fall back on) will probably be very tiring for her at first. You might want to wait until later in the week or the weekend to stop by, to give her time to settle in. That doesn’t apply to people who’ve already offered to come over with food or to help out, of course.

Have to make this quick so I will forgo the usual long list of people who need thanking. Just know how much we appreciate everything that you’re doing.

Jody continues to make progress. She’s stronger, is eating more, and needs less medication for pain and nausea. On Thursday she received permission to walk around in her room, transfer from bed to chair, etc. without supervision. Best of all, she has begun to regain control of her sphincters.

The biggest remaining problems are the sensory and motor deficits on her dominant left side, probably caused by nerve impingement, that make many tasks very challenging. Her left leg is weaker than her right; her left arm has a long way to go.

She is likely to be discharged from Healthsouth for home sometime next week, perhaps as early as Tuesday, though we’re trying to buy a little more time for additional inpatient physical and occupational therapy. As in so many health care decisions nowadays, it’s all driven by what the insurance company will pay for. Their guidelines don’t always make a lot of sense, sometimes to the point of being actively counterproductive.

I’m going to continue to assume that everyone reading this knows what has happened to Jody, where she is, and how to contact her. Feel free to ask if that assumption doesn’t match your circumstances.

Status

Jody is making terrific progress. Yesterday she walked around the outside of the hospital building, then did ten minutes on the treadmill and another ten on the stationary bicycle. Her heart rate during these exertions makes it clear that she retains much of her conditioning, and the muscle tone in her legs is starting to remind me of pre-injury Jody.

Jody’s fine motor skills also continue to improve. She can turn the pages of a magazine, open mail, button and zip clothes, tie her shoes, and pick up coins from a flat surface, mostly with her right hand. Her left hand continues to lag, but both hands are getting better daily.

I’m going to assume that everybody reading this knows what’s happened to Jody, what her prognosis is, and how to contact her. Feel free to ask me if you need the details.

Status

Jody is now officially allowed to eat normal foods. (The speech therapists got tired of getting frantic queries from the nurses every time I fed her something that wasn’t on her “OK list.”) She had lots of soup and fruit yesterday. She also ate some cottage cheese, chicken, and mashed potatoes from her hospital trays, and cookies and ice cream from our massive stash of yummy treats brought by friends. Her sense of taste is starting to return to normal. She is stick thin but seems to have stopped losing weight, if not actually started putting it back on. She has started yawning again, which she hadn’t done since she was injured. (If anyone has a sensible explanation for this I’d love to hear it.) And amazingly, the woman who drank almost an entire pot of coffee daily has had none for days and doesn’t seem to crave it.

For those who are just joining us, my wife, Dr. Jody Kaufman, was severely injured when she was thrown from her horse at a riding event in Rochester, NH on September 12th. She has significant degradation of sensation and voluntary movement in all extremities. MRI and CT scans showed degeneration and narrowing of the spinal canal, instability of the anterior longitudinal ligament which was displaced around vertebrae C5 and C6, disruption of other ligaments, and fractures of some of the spinous processes in that area. She also had minor facial injuries.

For those who are just joining us, my wife, Dr. Jody Kaufman, was severely injured when she was thrown from her horse at a riding event in Rochester, NH on September 12th. She has significant degradation of sensation and voluntary movement in all extremities. MRI and CT scans showed degeneration and narrowing of the spinal canal, instability of the anterior longitudinal ligament which was displaced around vertebrae C5 and C6, disruption of other ligaments, and fractures of some of the spinous processes in that area. She also had minor facial injuries and may have an entrapped nerve in her left shoulder.

For those who are just joining us, my wife, Dr. Jody Kaufman, was severely injured when she was thrown from her horse at a riding event in Rochester, NH on Wednesday. She is in the intensive care unit at Frisbie Memorial Hospital in Rochester, NH (map). She has significant degradation of sensation and voluntary movement in all extremities. MRI and CT scans showed degeneration and narrowing of the spinal canal, instability of the anterior longitudinal ligament which was displaced around vertebrae C5 and C6, disruption of other ligaments, and fractures of some of the spinous processes in that area. She also had minor facial injuries.

For those who are just joining us, my wife Dr. Jody Kaufman was severely injured when she was thrown from her horse at a riding event in Rochester, NH on Wednesday. I was traveling in Japan at the time and arrived home early Friday morning.