Covid Pneumonia ICU medical for Brandi

On Sunday Oct 3, my beautiful 30 year old, daughter-in-law developed a cough and fever. On the 4th she came back with a positive covid 19 test. She has Lupus so her immune system was already behind for this fight. She continued with over the counter medication through the week but her cough and fever were very persistent.

By Friday she her oxygen was dropping below 90 and they took their first trip to the ER. She was diagnosed with covid Pneumonia. She was given an inhaler, medication and send home with oxygen.

She struggled through the weekend. Coughing so intense she would vomit. This was incredibly painful due to her cough making her ribs and abdomen very sore. It would bring her to tears.

She tried everything at home, including a RN visit giving her an IV with vitamins and medications.

On Monday 11th her home oxygen was not enough and her oxygen sats suddenly dropped into the 70s. They went back to the ER. The ER said they could not stabilize her oxygen levels and she needed to go on high flow oxygen. This meant she had to be alone in the ER room due to the ability for covid to aerosol. My son left his wife in tears as he left and waited for her to be admitted to a room.

Monday night they had her on maximum high flow oxygen, steroids and antibiotics to try and get the cough and oxygen under control. If she deteriorated any further she would be forced on a ventilator.

Tuesday she seemed marginally better, they turned high flow oxygen down a notch and coughing was getting under control. Now was time for sleep. She had gotten extremely little sleep for over a week and her body was exhausted.

Wednesday was another day about the same as Tues. She slept alot and stayed in high flow oxygen while they continued medication.

Early Thursday (14th) even on high flow oxygen her oxygen dropped into the 70s and the cranked up back up to max. They put in a feeding tube because they thought she may have to go on the ventilator. They did an urgent CAT scan to get a better picture of what was going on in her lungs. Luckily there were no blot clot but she has alot of fluid on them.

She has had an amazing nurse through the day. That was determined to turn her around. He got her up, marching, sitting in a chair, breathing exercises as long as her oxygen could stay up. When it was dropped she had to lay back down but rotate from her left side to her right side every so often so they could get fluid to collect and hopefully cough it up. She fought like hell all day. She is incredibly thirsty and hungry. But due to the risk of anesthesia and intubation, they do not want hardly anything in her stomach.

By the evening, she is exhausted but atleast for the moment has been pulled off high flow oxygen for the first time in 3 days and on regular oxygen but at 8 liters.

Fri Oct 15 She worked very hard all night doing breathing exercises to clear fluid from her lungs. Sleeping was difficult as she kept gagging on her feeding tube that was moving around. By morning the decided to take her feeding tube out and she can actually start eating and drinking. Yay! Still on oxygen but making progress.

She is a Medical Assistant and recently made the jump to a stay at home mom. When she did so, they lost health insurance with the plan to get on my son's health insurance. They have to wait for an open enrollment window. So they do not have insurance st the worst possible time.

It is obvious the medical bills are going to be through the roof. They estimate she has another 5-7 days in there. Any amount raised in our small family/ social circle will surely not be enough but it will be 100% deeply appreciated by all of us that love her so much. Most of all her 3 children. She is there world 24hrs a day and she is gone. They do not know the severity of her condition, just that mom needed more oxygen than she could get at home. She is desperately trying to get back home to them. Any help would go a long way to helping them with this financial burden.