Meeting with the Neurosurgeon

Mom talked with the neurosurgeon Dr. Margetts today. He is not worried about the dementia and believes that Dad's mental acuity will come back. There doesn't appear to be any injury to Dad's brain, it looks good.

The nurse asked Dad to write his name, he wrote "name" and then he saw the "e" on the end of name and wrote "N" and then his last name. She said his writing is a bit shaky.

Dad has good movement in his arms. They had him sit on the side of his bed again today and were having him do some arm exercises. This caused a him to be a little more unsteady than usual (because of the arm movements) and he would sometimes start falling back.

The dr. also talked with her about what is causing dad to not be able to move his legs that well. The doctor gave two possible explanations. One is swelling and if that is the problem it would get better. The other is that it could be a anterior spinal cord stroke causing incomplete paralysis of the legs. Dad's posterior (large motor muscles) work better because he can lift his legs but has a hard time moving his toes. He also said that there may be ischemia which is lack of blood flow and infarction resulting in death of tissue. Dr. Margetts said this could be permanent but then again he said he has seen all kinds of things and dad could recover. The doctor said most often patients with these conditions start to compensate in other ways and can go on to walk normally.

Dad still has his lumbar drain in because they think the pressure on his spine may be contributing to the leg problem. They will be taking it out tomorrow because leaving it in could cause meningitis. He took a white blood cell count today that showed there were no white blood cells which is good because it means there is no infection.

They have Dad taking lasix which is a medication to help drain fluid. Mom said he is looking better but still needs to drain fluid. The diuretics are causing Dad to have low potassium so they are giving him potassium supplements every so often.

Dad's digestion is a bit slowed and they are hoping to see an improvement with that. They have started giving him some laxatives to help.

She said to please continue to pray for him and to specifically pray for his legs, intestines, bladder and cognitive functions.