LTAC

About a week ago, the social worker on Dad's case came to talk to me about moving Dad to a different wing of the hospital, for long term acute care (LTAC). I was pretty unhappy with the idea, mostly because I still have a hard time wrapping my mind around the whole idea of how long Dad's healing might actually take. Mom was equally unhappy about it, but Dawn managed to talk some sense into us. (Thank God for Dawn!!!)

An LTAC is not, as we'd feared, a place where they just "park" patients who are unlikely to recover their facilities enough to live a relatively independent life. It is, however, a place that can provide Dad with rehab exercises a couple times a day, even before he's regained consciousness. It's also well-equipped to handle patients who've had tracheotomies, are on a ventilator (which Dad's not anymore!), have a brain drain (which Dad doesn't anymore!), etc.

So, after we got over our initial negative reactions, Mom did a fabulous job of calling around and asking about the different LTACs in the area to see which ones different people recommended. Amazingly -- seriously people, this was totally God at work, as far as we're concerned -- every single person that Mom talked to recommended Select Specialty, the LTAC associated with Presbyterian/St. Luke's hospital. The neurosurgeon, the case worker, Mom's friend from church, and Dawn's pharmacist friends -- everyone. It would also be much more convenient to keep Dad within the same hospital buildings, and should they need to transfer Dad back to the ICU if anything worrisome happened, then they just wheel him on down the hallways rather than trying to transport him via ambulance anywhere. And, everyone in the ICU is already familiar with Dad's case.

Mom & Dawn set up an appointment to see the folks at Select Specialty this afternoon, and both of them were positively glowing when they talked to me about it afterward. They both said that everyone there seemed super positive, great attitudes, always saying "when Ed wakes up," never "if." We are all just so, so, so, soooooooo glad that everything worked out. No difficult decisions, no conflicting advice, all the arrows pointing in the same direction. Thank God.

They may decide to move Dad into the LTAC as early as Monday or Tuesday, if he gets his brain flap surgery tomorrow morning. Otherwise it'll have to wait until next Friday-ish. I'll keep you all informed!

--Kristy