Posted by SandyWeb on April 23, 2007, at 10:30:38
In reply to Re: Dilaudid, posted by crenshaw387 on April 21, 2007, at 23:06:55
Thanks for the responses. My 15-year old daughter still has pain 24/7 on the Dilaudid, but it is so much more gentle on her tummy than the morphine was. Morphine made her nauseaus, no matter what dose or how much Gravol they gave with it. We know never to have her put on Morphine again if there's a need for a strong pain med. *smile*
I have tried different variations on her dosing (from 4-6 hours and lowest to highest dose). She is even allowed to take it every 2 hours for break-through pain, but I've only done that once. I just don't want to have her on it all the time. We have finally gotten to the point where she can MOST of the time wait 5 hours for her dosing now, but it's still at the highest dose. It doesn't make her high or "weird"....just tired (which is good because sleep is beneficial to healing). Although, I have to admit that she has the funkiest dreams now! I call them her "drug dreams", and told her to enjoy them while she has them. She probably won't ever dream like that again. Lol. Tomorrow will be one week since her surgery, and I do see changes towards improvement....but we still have a long ways to go.
The next plan I have is to get her to 6 hours between dosing (plus she has other meds, so she's not relying solely on the Dilaudid), but that hasn't worked out yet. Once we're stable at 6 hours, then I'll start trying to slowly reduce the amount I give her. I'm sure we'll be getting refills, but once those run out, she may just be put on Codeine (which I find very mild). At some point, she'll be going back to her classes in Grade 9, and we can't have her falling asleep at her desk! Lol. Her teachers have been SO supportive of her ordeal. She had two girlfriends visit her in the hospital and when they realized that it was their friend laying in that bed, they both said, "Holy crap!". LOL.
Now I just have to get more fluids in her since she can't open her mouth. Tough! She won't touch the chocolate Ensure, and I bought 11 CASES of it!!! I think she will get hungry enough, as time passes, that she'll find she wants to try it. Yogart and ice cream are too thick, even when thinned out with milk. But we're still only in Week One. I think she's doing very well, but it's pretty darn scary at times....especially for a mum with anxiety issues. But I've been, amazingly enough, handling this quite well! I guess because it's dealing with my daughter and not with myself.
Thanks again for your responses, and sorry for rambling on. It helps to just type things out and know that someone is reading it.
God bless,
Sandy
poster:SandyWeb
thread:752014
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070419/msgs/752697.html