Epistaxis

It has been a long week.

---

.

MONDAY

Tapering my steroids has been moving along, so it seemed like a good time to meet with my Cardio Thoracic Surgery Team. Hubby drove me into the city and accompanied me to the appointment. The nurse practitioner is fabulous and juggles all the administrative and back-end details. She paged the surgeon, and we were able to have him explain things, ask questions, etc.

The overall summary is 🤞🤞surgery will tentatively take place in the next few weeks🤞🤞! My steroid dose needs to stabilize, I have to stay healthy, the surgical schedule needs to fall into place, etc.

****Content warning**** - if you don't want to read medically detailed/graphic information, skip down to FRIDAY

TUESDAY

I woke up in the middle of the night with my nose bleeding. I went to the bathroom and began the cycle of pinching my nose for 15 minutes, checking to see if the bleeding stopped, pinching my nose for 15 minutes. check to see if the bleeding stopped, pinch, etc. After 30+ minutes I woke my hubby up. Eventually my nosebleed subsided, and we both went back to bed.

A few hours later, my nose started bleeding again. This time we could not get it under control. My hubby called 911 and the paramedics arrived quickly. They kept telling me to pinch my nose and to lean forward, and then quickly assessed the need to take me to the local ER. It took a bit to get me down the stairs with my nose pinched and head over a trash can. I don't remember most of the ambulance trip because I was leaning forward with my head in a basin as my nose continued to bleed and I continued to cough up clots. I was transferred to the ER bed and surrounded by nurses. They started asking me lots of questions, and I got very frustrated because when I tried to talk, I couldn't breathe due to all the clots. Hubby was not far behind the ambulance. He arrived quickly and took over answering the questions for me. My nose slowly stopped bleeding and the doctor tried to remove the clot in the back of my throat. I continued coughing up clots and eventually threw up. The ER doctor cauterized a spot in my nose, but he wasn't confident it would stop the nosebleeds. I ended up throwing out the shirt I had been wearing - so the nurse said I could go home in the hospital gown. I also didn't have any shoes, so I went home in the hospital footies. I was quite the sight sitting outside on the bench waiting for Jeff to pull up to get me!

WEDNESDAY

I was able to snag an afternoon appointment with my ENT. He examined my sinuses, suctioned out lots of clots and tried to determine the source of the bleed. After cleaning out my nose, he inserted some packing to absorb any further bleeding. He also laid out a plan for if the bleeding continued - a procedure to clip an artery in the nose to prevent further bleeding. This would be a last resort but would help ensure the nose bleeds would not interfere with the planned aortic valve replacement.

THURSDAY

More nosebleeds and several phone calls to ENT led to the recommendation to head to my teaching hospital to be admitted through the ER. I was triaged quickly, including an EKG and some blood work. We were sent back to the ER waiting room anticipating an up to five hour wait. Not too long into our wait the ENT team showed up in the waiting room. We chatted briefly and they let me know that I would be assessed in the ER, then admitted to the hospital, and then hopefully have a procedure/surgery the next day to clip an artery in my nose.

FRIDAY

After a night in the hospital, Friday morning brought visits from lots of doctors - one of which was the ENT who would be performing the procedure to clip the artery in my nose. He was hoping to get me on the schedule first thing, but due to scheduling constraints, I was not able to get on his schedule until the end of the day. Most of Friday was spent resting - oh, and did I mention I was "NPO" starting the night before ("nothing by mouth" - no food or drink!).

Finally, around 3:30 PM, they brought me down to pre-op to get ready for the procedure. The ENT came to talk to us, then the anesthesia team. With everyone prepped and ready, they took me back to the operating room for the procedure. For the next 45 minutes I had a really good nap while the surgeon fixed everything in my nose. All went smoothly and I was back in my room around 7:30 PM ready to eat a delicious turkey sandwich.

SATURDAY

After getting some sleep (a good night's sleep in the hospital is nearly impossible), Saturday was discharge day. A few doctors came in to see me, and then I was finally discharged to go home. We arrived back home around 12:30pm - no more nose bleeds!