Allergies for Abby

About 2 weeks ago Abby started with a dry cough. I assumed it was something she picked up at the pool since there are so many people at the community swimming pool. It turned into a wet cough pretty fast and it's been that way ever since. She doesn't have a fever, she's not lethargic, her saturations are good (having this fancy CF equipment is good for something!) but she still has the stinking cough.

The other night Paul and I tired to listen to her with my disposable stethoscope. When you're an isolation patient in the hospital, such as myself, they have to use single patient use equipment, including a stethoscope, which I have taken home on more than one occasion because they just throw them out when I leave anyway.

Well, to the untrained ear, I could hear something in her lungs, but not really what I would describe as a rattle. More like a whooshing monotone rumble, if that makes sense.

So today, enough was enough. i called her doctor and by 10am they had not called me back so I just walked her into Urgent Care. BTW the doctor NEVER called me back, so I think we are done with that office. We were out of Urgent Care in less than a half hour with a diagnosis of seasonal allergy wheezing and bronchospasms. The doctor said he would give her antibiotics if I wanted her to have them, but he didn't think she had an infection. This made sense to me since I haven't caught it, and I catch everything!

So he gave her a prescription for Xopenex, which is something I have laying around the house all the time. It's just the puffer (like asthmatics use). She's had two doses and I don't see an improvement in her cough yet, so, hmmmm... We'll just have to wait and see. If I don't see any improvement over the weekend I think I'm going to have to call in some favors and see if my lung doctor will see her as a new patient on Monday. Normally it takes about 6 weeks to get in there... but I'm hoping since I've personally been a patient there for over 20 years, I can pull some sort of seniority card.

This following picture has nothing to do with this post, but it was taken on Monday after Paul got back from Pezamania in Cleveland. There are a couple new little fellows in there.