Thursday, June 19, 2025

Three Beautiful Things 06-18-2025: A Successful Biopsy Day

 1. Today, with the agreement of the Sacred Heart transplant team, began Dr. Bieber's quest to see if testing will answer the riddling question of why protein has started to show up in my urine and to identify what kind of protein it is. 

This quest began today with a biopsy of my transplanted kidney. 

Christy picked me up at 5:45 a.m. and we arrived at Kootenai Health at a perfect time. No one else was looking to check in around 6:35  and within a few minutes the check-in woman gave me the green light to waltz down to Specialty Procedures where I answered more questions, submitted to a pre-biopsy blood draw ( I discovered when I arrived home that the lab results were awesome), the insertion of an IV port (or whatever it's called), and a very helpful explanation by Doctor Khorsand as to what I could expect from the performance of this procedure. 

2. Once in the what I'll call the biopsy room, a kind and friendly nurse hooked me up to an IV with a moderate sedative and before I knew it, Dr. Khorsand had inserted the needle, secured three samples, and found out the pathologists reported they had all the tissue they needed. 

Dr. Khorsand told me I did a good job (lying there I guess! :) ) and the kind and friendly nurse wheeled me back to the prep room where I recovered for four hours. I drank coffee. I slept a bit. I ate a Mediterranean salad for lunch. Nurse Ray called Christy and she came to my room and we yakked until another nurse discharged me a little after 1:00. 

Dr. Khorsand thought we'd have a report on the biopsy in 5-7 business days. 

No problem. 

3.  The discharge nurse and the discharge papers both instructed me to take it easy for the rest of today and probably the next two days.

Once Christy dropped me off at home, I soon hit the wall and fell into a super deep sleep.

Once awake, I made sure Copper's and Gibbs' needs were met, completed my usual morning routine of puzzle solving and blog writing, ate quick-to-prepare snacks, and by nine o'clock, I hit the hay. 

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