So long for now Bethesda, hello Cleveland Clinic

Family and friends,

After waiting until 11pm last night to be transferred, Bob finally made it to the Cleveland Clinic in Weston. I followed behind the ambulance in my car. The EMT actually knew one of Bob's friends Charlie so it made for a smoother ride for Bob. After getting here I was amazed at how spacious the room was (it looks like Bob's staying in a hotel room) and how welcoming the night nurse was. She offered Bob some food and jello, gave me a bed to sleep on in his room, and we were seen by 2 of the internists last night. I gave them the run down of everything Bob had and they took blood and we slept until morning. I'd give our night nurse Laura a solid B+.

Then morning came and we got a new nurse. A guy named Patrick who seemed to be in training. Patrick got a "D" for Bob's care. I didn't want to come out with guns blasing today so that I'd get a reputation of being a pain, but everytime Bob needed something I had to ask 3 times. The internal medicine team rounded this morning, and I went over all of Bob's records again. My biggest concern was that Bob is getting NONE of the medicine he was getting at Bethesda. No protonics for ulcers, no blood pressure medicine, nothing. I told just about everyone who came in the room, and 12 hours later still nothing. I told them Bob needed a special air bed for the wound on his butt that has gone down to the fat layer, and even though the night nurse ordered it last night (It's 8pm now the next day) and Bob still hasn't received it. Patrick his nurse told us that beds are outsourced by a seperate company and that it could take up to 24 hours. Speaking of wound care, I told them yesterday he needed to be seen by a wound care specialist. No one came by, and I asked 3 times, so the nurses changed it. I harrassed them as much as I could but they said he'd have to wait until tomorrow. In addition, Bob had to have a CT scan done today of his abdomen. When he got back at 1pm he was starving. They didn't get him lunch. I had to ask Patrick 3 times to order it, and it took 2 hours. Although this is a very high tech hospital with really nice rooms, I don't see the personalized care that he had at Bethesda. I am hoping that I'm wrong since today is the first day, but we'll see.



In addition and more importantly the GI doctors stopped by. Bethesda didn't send over all the records so I had to spend the morning having to get them to fax pathology GI reports over here. Trust me, if I didn't do it, it wouldn't have gotten done until next week. The GI docs didn't want to make any decisions about how to proceed with Bob until they got them. So around 3pm they came by and we discussed. Unfortunately they said the pathology report was vague so they need to request the actual slides from Bethesda. This will probably take until Monday to get back, then their pathologist has to read it, then they have to decide how to proceed, so Bob will most likely not be having surgery until the middle of next week. For the good news the GI docs were really nice from the initial visit. They had their act together, they explained why they needed the pathology to make the best decision about Bob. That being said, they understood the need to stop the bleeding as quickly as possible in order for Bob to recieve the consoldation therapy as soon as we can. Speaking of chemo, the Oncologist came by and he was very nice. One strange thing he said was that this hospital doesn't have a dedicated oncology ward.

Bob's new night nurse just came in. Let's hope she's better than the day one. Hopefully she can get Bob his new bed. Keep your fingers crossed!

Love and thanks,
Michele