Pray for the Courtney's

I've continued to track along with both the Rohr's and the Courtney's through their caring bridge sites as they are facing "uncharted territory" down at Riley Hospital in Indianapolis. My heart sank as I read this most recent post about Kayla Courtney (car accident) by her dad Paul...

One step forward, two steps back over the last 24 hours.

Jeanette noticed something in Kayla last night that caused her to choose sleeping in Kayla's ICU room recliner rather than the Ron McD room. Becca decided to stay with Kayla also and also keep Mom company. Jeanette called me after 3 hrs. of sleep at the room and I went back to help her and Becca. Sure enough, mother's intuition was correct. Kayla became very agitated in the later evening and it grew worse. I won't go into details, but will say that jeanette did not get a wink of sleep and Becca not much more while trying to calm Kayla down and restrain her when she attempted to remove various IV and other tubing. She pulled out about 14 inches of her N-G (Naso-Gastro) tube running through her nose and into her stomach that drains bile, and tore the ECG/respiratory monitoring tubes from an artery in her wrist (blood everywhere). Kayla woke up most of her ICU wing with dilerious screams. Nurses and doctors came to the scene and tried to help. After Kayla spent most of her energy and became sick to her stomach (not quite as bad as Linda Blair in the Exorcist), she was given a sedative and morphine was stopped. Jeanette insisted that Kayla does not react well with prolonged morphine.

Doctors believed that Kayla's actions were as a result of several things - ICU psychosis (too long in one room), narcotic withdrawl (her morphine was being decreased), and/or sepsis (infection) in the peritoneal cavity. Dr. Josh Waters (GI surgery staff) was able to get a CT scan ordered for mid-day to check for an infection (cyst) and evaluate the lungs for pulmonary embolis, integrity of the GI tract, and other issues.

Kayla exited the CT scan shortly after 2:30 p.m. shaking like a leaf on a tree. By the time we got back up to her ICU room, she developed a 105 degree temp. Ice downs, cold cloth washes and Tylenol knocked the fever down to 102. CT scan results confirmed the presence of sepsis (infection inside a cyst in the peritoneal cavity). Treatment will be a lance from the exterior of her abdomen to drain the cyst and administer antibiotics. Sounds like that is scheduled for tonight sometime after 7 p.m. The infection explains a lot of Kayla's symptoms and actions last night.

Kayla is resting fairly well now and is not experiencing the psychosis we battled over night.

Would you join me in praying for a divine touch from God to Kayla and her family in ICU?