Wednesday I had a chest x-ray to check the progress of the upper right lobe where I was having the slight pain, which is where the x-ray showed the atelectasis (air trapping).  My x-ray was unchanged.  The prednisone didn’t do much if anything for the atelectasis.  The next step is a chest CT.  I am scheduled for the CT Thursday the 17th.  After they get the results from the CT we will then figure out what the next step will be and if there needs to be.  The atelectasis could simply be more shadowing and not as prominent as it appears which the CT will give us a more definite answer.

If the CT shows something significant there will be a few options of treatment.  We could do a round of antibiotics in hope to treat and lessen the junk in there or we could also do a bronchoscopy to suck out all the junk that is “trapped” in there.  At my appointment yesterday to find out the results of my GTT (Glucose Tolerance Test), Iron study (blood work) and x-ray results I told my doc that I had a dream that he came into the room and said that they were going to need to bronch me.  He chuckled and said, “Well that’s funny because Dr. K came around the corner as I was looking at your x-ray and he asked who it was, so I told him.  He then said, “Man I don’t want to bronch her and I said me either.””  I found that kind of funny.  Who know what will happen.  All I know is I want the junk out of there and don’t really want a bronch but if it needs to be done I will endure it as usual.

The results of my GTT were ok.  If you don’t know how the GTT works, let me explain.  You can’t eat anything after midnight.  Then the next day you go into the lab and they draw a fasting blood specimen then you have to drink the glucose drink from hell (hahaha).  Actually it tastes much better than it used to BUT that doesn’t mean the hours following are any better.  You then have to wait 1 hour to get a blood draw and then again at 2 hours after drinking the glucose drink.  My results were good.  My 1 hour test was slightly high but not by much at all.  They really look at the fasting and the 2 hour test results, of which mine were good.  Yay!!!!  Now to do it again in a year, oh what joy it brings just thinking about it.  My iron blood work was slightly low but nothing warranting any iron IV infusions.  I just need to take over the counter iron and we will recheck my levels in the future.

In other news, today is Veterans Day.  Thank you to everyone who has served and continue to serve our country, including my husband.  I am blessed to be on this journey with my husband.

Until next time…