How this began #2

This journey began in the fall of 2004 when we were moving my daughter, Jennifer, into her first off campus room at Western Washington University. It was a usual dark and dreary night. We had the Escape full of beds, books and clothes.

I parked the car and got out to go look for the address of a unlit house, when I turned and saw Jen and her friend driving up to tell us we were at the wrong house. I slipped on the wet concrete, twisted my ankle and fell across the bricks lining the sidewalk. As I tried to pick myself up, I realized something was broken. Both my ankle and leg were torn up.

I literally crawled back to the car and ask Robin to take me to the emergency room, then go unpack Jen and come back and get me.

I had broken my right tibia and my ankle had come apart as the ligaments tore. I was put into a boot and instructed to go see my physicians back in Redmond.

On Monday I was referred by my primary care physician to Orthopedic Department at Evergreen Hospital in Kirkland. The department head agreed to do the repair surgery ASAP, but later I was advised he was leaving the hospital and I was referred to another surgeon to go forward with the post surgery follow.

During the surgical recovery, the internal stitches didn't dissolve as expected, poked through the wound and became the super highway for staph germs. To treat the staph infection, the doctors installed a cardiac catheter to allow me to directly inject strong antibiotics into my heart. If I remember this was to improve the distribution of the antibiotics as well as protecting my heart from the staph. A visiting nurse came by weekly to check the catheter-body interface and to replenish my antibiotics. I would go see the "infection" doctor twice a week to check up the status of the infection. It had to be totally gone before they'd remove the catheter.

In parallel, I had a history of bulging discs in my neck that had been treated with a steroid injection directly into the discs. This had relieved the discomfort for a few years, but it resurfaced after my fall. I took a friend's advise and went to a Chiropractor for relief. I was very specific about avoiding twisting my neck and I only wanted massage to reduce the spasms in my neck and shoulders. She must of tuned me out and without warning cracked my neck. I knew immediately that something was wrong. That night I couldn't breath while lying down.

The next day I had the appointment with the infections doctor and told him about the breathing difficulty. He rushed me to the hospital for a CAT Scan. He was worried about a blood clot. When I tried to lie down on the CAT Scan table, my breathing stopped. They admitted me to the hospital again. This was around Christmas of 2004.

It became obvious that Evergreen's pulmonary department had no experience diagnosing an unfamiliar problem like this. They ordered a sleep apnea study, had me prop up the bed to rest and basically couldn't find their butt with both hands. I literally checked myself out and went home. Elaine insisted that I get myself to the University of Washington Medical Center ASAP.

I went to Dr. Josh Benditt the next week. Dr. Benditt immediately discovered my diaphragm was not working at all. The next day I went to a neurologist who pulled up a Boston Medical Journal article describing Phrenic nerve paralysis cause by Chiropractic manipulation. The neck cracking pinched both Phrenic nerves that control the diaphragm. This confirmed Dr. Benditt's diagnosis. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrenic_nerve)

The respiratory therapist at the UW, sent me home with a BiPAP machine. (www.wiseguy.com/what-is-bipap.htm) This is a super version of the machines that are used to treat sleep apnea and control acid reflex. I got the best night's sleep I had had in 60 days! It was a life changing event! The key word here is GERD or Acid Reflux Disease. This will be the topic for the next edition tomorrow... (https://health.google/health/ref/Gastroesophageal+reflux+disease)