In yesterday’s post, I gave a brief summary of the medical challenges my mother, Marie Bond, has faced this year and described a procedure she was having yesterday for arterial disease. Here’s an update.

Yesterday, my mother had a right femoral angiogram, angioplasty, and insertion of a stent to increase the blood flow to her right leg. Access was by way of her left brachial artery, through the aorta, and down to the right femoral artery–a long way around from the left arm to the right leg.

The procedure was done fairly late in the day, but went well. Last night, she had to go back in the OR because of a hematoma at the insertion point in her arm, mid way between the elbow and shoulder on the inside. She takes Plavix (clopidogrel) and baby aspirin, both blood thinners (anticoagulants) used after a heart attack, and evidently hematoma formation (pooling of blood) is a common problem because blood pools in the wound area. The procedure to clear it up also went well, although they transferred her to the ICU instead of to a regular room. The original plan was to send her home today, but we’re still waiting to hear.

I just talked to my mother on the phone, and she sounds a big groggy from the two twilight anesthesias yesterday. Otherwise, she sounded good and said she felt fine except for her left arm, which is swollen and sore. The doctor checked her pulses and said they sounded great–in both legs. Apparently improving blood flow in one also has benefit in the other.

My mother is in a suburban Pennsylvania hospital that we’ve all been pretty impressed with, and she seems to have found a very good vascular surgeon.

So we do have things to be grateful for, even though we don’t quite know what our Thanksgiving will look like on Thursday. . . .