Courageous Chris Fighting Legionella
Donation protected
Well life does throw you some curveballs sometimes.
Here we were in Spain enjoying a lovely family holiday when chris starts to feel extremely tired & short of breath. In typical guy fashion he assured us that a rest is all he needed. Unfortunately that was not the case & the next few weeks proved to be a living nightmare.
By the time we were able to convince chris to see a doctor he could hardly breathe & his heart was racing. We ended up being 'blue lit' to hospital where the team there immediately admitted him to that ICU.
It turns out that he contracted legionella bacteria on a recent business trip & as the incubation period is typically between 7-10 days the symptoms didn't show until we were in Spain. This led to severe pneumonia & as a result chris was put on a ventilator to help him breathe. The next few days were critical as he went into septic shock - his organs were failing. Dialysis was added to the list of machines now by his bed along with multiple antibiotics/ medication to control his blood pressure and all sorts of nutritional stuff to keep him going.
Chris was on the ventilator for 1 week before the doctors said his lungs had improved to a point that they may work by themselves. He gave it a good go but it was still a little too much pressure on his heart so on Wednesday of the week he had a tracheotomy & therefore has the assistance of the breathing apparatus if he needs it.
Things started to look up when the team said his kidneys were working again (yay) and for those of you that know chris well you'll appreciate why we laughed when they said he was finally producing bowel sounds!! Obviously with a tracheotomy you can't eat or drink (which he loves to do) so that's another battle he has to overcome.
His sedation is now being slowly reduced & within a few days he may be breathing well enough to have the trache removed.
Naturally all of this has been a massive shock to our systems but chris continues to defy the odds & is slowly improving all of the time.
Being in Spain has been incredibly hard on all of the family members with the obvious language barriers & me being away from the kids for weeks on end. I cannot thank our friends & family enough for all of the kind messages of support & love. We're gonna need bucket loads more though.
My patient is still as gorgeous & strong as ever. I'm unbelievably proud of him & how far he has come. I know he's gonna kick this thing in the butt!!
Obviously there's a long road to recovery ahead & chris will not be working for the foreseeable future. There are many things he's going to need once he is finally well enough to come home so I have decided to set up a fundraising page through gofundme. I will keep the page updated with his progress & how the funds are being spent. He's not one for material things so I feel any donations could be better spend on him or the kids.
Here we were in Spain enjoying a lovely family holiday when chris starts to feel extremely tired & short of breath. In typical guy fashion he assured us that a rest is all he needed. Unfortunately that was not the case & the next few weeks proved to be a living nightmare.
By the time we were able to convince chris to see a doctor he could hardly breathe & his heart was racing. We ended up being 'blue lit' to hospital where the team there immediately admitted him to that ICU.
It turns out that he contracted legionella bacteria on a recent business trip & as the incubation period is typically between 7-10 days the symptoms didn't show until we were in Spain. This led to severe pneumonia & as a result chris was put on a ventilator to help him breathe. The next few days were critical as he went into septic shock - his organs were failing. Dialysis was added to the list of machines now by his bed along with multiple antibiotics/ medication to control his blood pressure and all sorts of nutritional stuff to keep him going.
Chris was on the ventilator for 1 week before the doctors said his lungs had improved to a point that they may work by themselves. He gave it a good go but it was still a little too much pressure on his heart so on Wednesday of the week he had a tracheotomy & therefore has the assistance of the breathing apparatus if he needs it.
Things started to look up when the team said his kidneys were working again (yay) and for those of you that know chris well you'll appreciate why we laughed when they said he was finally producing bowel sounds!! Obviously with a tracheotomy you can't eat or drink (which he loves to do) so that's another battle he has to overcome.
His sedation is now being slowly reduced & within a few days he may be breathing well enough to have the trache removed.
Naturally all of this has been a massive shock to our systems but chris continues to defy the odds & is slowly improving all of the time.
Being in Spain has been incredibly hard on all of the family members with the obvious language barriers & me being away from the kids for weeks on end. I cannot thank our friends & family enough for all of the kind messages of support & love. We're gonna need bucket loads more though.
My patient is still as gorgeous & strong as ever. I'm unbelievably proud of him & how far he has come. I know he's gonna kick this thing in the butt!!
Obviously there's a long road to recovery ahead & chris will not be working for the foreseeable future. There are many things he's going to need once he is finally well enough to come home so I have decided to set up a fundraising page through gofundme. I will keep the page updated with his progress & how the funds are being spent. He's not one for material things so I feel any donations could be better spend on him or the kids.
Organizer
Anna Oliver
Organizer