A test back...

I received a fax back today with my results from the oximetry tests this weekend--fast! Anyway, it's not great news, and proves something is going on even when I have my oxygen on, and my sleep apnea machine (cpap). On Friday night, I didn't desaturate at all, and was able to keep my pulse and oxygen up. But Saturday night was quite different. I had a sore throat and fever when I went to bed. The test looks like I had some kind of event...a long apnea???, that sent my blood oxygen down from 96% to 79% within 3 minutes (way fast). Then, pulse went up to 250...which is severe tachycardia (fast pulse/heart rate). Then, for an hour, I seem to recover and have no problems (huh?) and then for the next 5 hours I go in and out of hypoxia with my blood oxygen levels mostly between 70-80% (hypoxia is below 88%). And then there are hours were my pulse is low 32-48 beats. Obviously, this is not good--it might be showing what happens to me when I have any illness that affects my breathing and sleep apnea. I am not sure what it all means, so hopefully my specialists can figure it out. I sent the test to the cardiologist. The sleep apnea doctor got it today. Hopefully, I'll know more tomorrow.

It's pretty scary to know this happens when I sleep, but in some ways, I've known I go up and down like this for months, so it's not a big shock. Hopefully, tomorrow, the specialists will insist that I get an alarm that sounds when my blood oxygen goes too low. It's been held up by my primary care doctor being in "classes" now for 2 weeks and she won't be back until next Tuesday. I got on their case today, but still no call back. This is after last week, they delayed these tests for 7 days by not calling me or setting them up after my sleep apnea doctor called them....aaaghhh. Medical care here is not "top of the line"....

But there is also good news. I have a job interview to be a school occupational therapist. It is in Traverse City, Michigan, which is about 4 1/2 hours due north of where I am living now. It's full time and great pay and benefits. It would get me out of poverty. But I am having mixed feelings about it, as when I applied a month ago, I was doing so much better. I guess I'll just have to hope that my health improves enough to work full-time by September. My interview is in Traverse City on the 22nd. It's a wonderful little resort town on Lake Michigan--very cold--frozen tundra in the winter. The intermediate school district I would work for covers quite a big geographical area though; four counties I think, because it is so rural.

So that's the news in my life this week. Oh, I am still fighting Medicaid. Nobody has called me back in weeks, despite my many attempts. But I am trying to concentrate on getting the medical care, not worrying about Medicaid...eventually, I will be found to be correct as far as Medicaid laws go. Lovely Michigan government though we have.

Take good care all... Laurie