Yep, my wife and I were both down at the same time for weeks. Life was pretty miserable.
What's new where you live?
- Thread starter DirtDiva
- Start date
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I very much appreciate and welcome your advice Kevin! Not drinking and won’t be. As far as walking around, I am staying a little active, even though I’m tired. My new chicks need taken care of and my hens do too. I also feed the geese on our small lake. Been taking my dog out too. Animals keep even sick people from being too relaxed.
Danil54grl
Top Poster
I think I would have sent your husband, since your guesthouse hadn't been contaminated yet. Just let your hunny know he will need to disinfect the house. All sheets, towels, wash rags, maybe even curtains in rooms that you have been in washed. All counters, floors, nicknacks and even furniture. . . Maybe I'm paranoid but I would do everything in the rooms you had been in.
Hi again. Just to clarify my qualifications for espousing my opinions. I am a physician with about 40 yr experience in critical care medicine. surgery and anesthesiology. I have worked in 5 countries in 4 continents. Regarding the possibility of neurological complications of Covid-19, it is a possibility especially if some patients develop encephalitis from the virus. I speak from personal experience here having survived an episode of viral encephalitis about 12 yr ago.
It is too soon to know whether there will be secondary complications from this infection. I haven’t read that neurological presentations are typical. Rather, a picture of respiratory failure, multi organ failure and septic shock. But I haven’t personally treated any of those patients.
Most of my research has been in the field of managing acute respiratory failure and the effects of different ventilator designs on pulmonary function.
I have also set up a Facebook Service for providing tele medicine for anyone who is interested.
It is too soon to know whether there will be secondary complications from this infection. I haven’t read that neurological presentations are typical. Rather, a picture of respiratory failure, multi organ failure and septic shock. But I haven’t personally treated any of those patients.
Most of my research has been in the field of managing acute respiratory failure and the effects of different ventilator designs on pulmonary function.
I have also set up a Facebook Service for providing tele medicine for anyone who is interested.
I wanted the guesthouse. He thought the same as you. LOL. He Lysoled, sprayed counters and washed the bedding and cleaned bath rooms. Probably all for nothing because I will be surprised if I haven’t already given it to him...unfortunately.
Danil54grl
Top Poster
Well I am glad it got done. . . not sure my hunny would have.
My guy is a clean freak.
Danil54grl
Top Poster
Count your blessings
!! If it was up to my hunny the house would never get dusted. . .
DirtDiva
A True Doomsday Prepper
Yep 2 of my adult kids are in the cabin for 14 days at the least since they are both coming from hot zones. Both are well thus far. Both coming from large cities and work tech jobs that can be worked from home. Both also single.
Thanks for the insight.
Kevin L
A True Doomsday Prepper
Brent S
Top Poster
But dust is part of my decor!Count your blessings
Kevin L
A True Doomsday Prepper
I heard that there is a drastic shortage of ventilators, and this raised a question about a possibly helpful stopgap.
I worked in EMS as a paramedic (and Field Training Officer) for almost 12 years, and we used to use an awful machine that we called a 'Thumper'.
It was a pneumatic-powered CPR device that also worked as a kind of crude ventilator to keep the patient oxygenated through the ET tube. We sometimes used an end-tidal CO2 monitor in combination with this.
I'm sure that these devices have been retired ages ago, but I imagine that they're sitting in mothballs somewhere.
It seems like it would be a simple matter to disable the pneumatic piston component of the device that did chest compressions, and just keep the ventilator part. If fittings have to modified, I imagine it could run on air as well as pure O2 if respiratory alkalosis is a concern.
These devices were crude, but it seems to me that this simplicity would be a benefit for one nurse and/or respiratory therapist who has to manage 50 patients in an epidemic.
I'm only suggesting this as an alternative to letting people die from lack of equipment, and I don't pretend that this device is--in any way--ideal.
Is there a respository somewhere of mothballed medical devices . . . like the military storing guns from WWII in cosmoline for decades on end?
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Patients need oxygen, not air pressure. The ventilators have been causing damage.
You need to keep the lungs constantly inflated using low tidal volume to prevent damage to the lungs by the ventilator. I'm sure schpier can provide more specifics.
Kevin L
A True Doomsday Prepper
Pure oxygen used excessively over a long period of time can also cause problems.
In the old days of EMS, everybody got tons of oxygen** . . . even COPD patients, which--as paramedics--meant little to us because we have the patient for 20 minutes before we run and get another one, but nurses get bent out of shape from giving a COPD* patient high-flow oxygen, because these patients' impulse to breathe comes from the 'carbonic drive'.
It's beyond the scope of a forum post to go into detail about what this is, but it means that too much 02 interferes with the body chemistry in a way that makes these patients stop breathing. The process usually takes a long time, so it wasn't a concern to a medic, but--at the same time--a big concern to a nurse who may have a patient for 12 hours, so you see the source of the traditional "nurse vs. medic" conflict in this issue.
Now, we have devices (like a "pulse oximeter") that constantly measures the oxygenation of the blood, and 02 can be adjusted according to what's needed.
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* COPD is Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, and includes asthma, emphysema, chronic bronchitis, and cystic fibrosis.
** There was an oddball exception to giving patients O2. In the 1970s, the CIA sprayed an herbicide called Paraquat on marijuana fields in Mexico. If you smoked weed contaminated with Paraquat . . . you could die, and giving pure, high-flow O2 to a paraquat patient, could kill them faster. I, personally, have never treated a paraquat patient, so I'm only parroting our medical director's priorities on this issue.
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Count your blessings
Oh I count them every day! His mother trained him early! LOL.
You took the words out of my mouth Urbanprep. Wishing all of our members and families a full health and full recoveries if affected!! God bless and heal you all. Gary
chihuahuasniper
Member
Homeless meth-heads everywhere breaking into shrouded/locked power outlets outside of buildings to charge their phones. Light rail trains still running with very limited passengers. Downtown Sacramento is completely dead, but for some utility workers, but the suburbs and rich neighborhoods are bustling with families biking and people walking their dogs. 99% of the people outside right now are white.
Hopefully, as suggested by the news media, there seems to be a decrease in the numbers of patients needing mechanical ventilation. Nevertheless, there continues to be a shortage of the devices. A few points from my perspective:
The lungs of patients suffering from Covid19 pneumonia/pneumonitis are “stiff” ( layman term). Compare trying to inflate a nice elastic balloon vs a stiff plastic coke bottle.
Moreover, the diseased lung stiffness ( low pulmonary compliance ) is distributed in a patchy pattern, mostly in the peripheral areas. The stiff, diseased areas, require a higher pressure to inflate than the areas of the lung that are not diseased and which are more effective in gas transfer than the diseased parts.
So attempts to apply a high inflation pressure to the whole lung at one time, will place the less diseased area at risk of bursting - since those areas are elastic and susceptible to overinflation ( a balloon popping ).
That is called barotrauma, a well known, critical complication of mechanical ventilation.
To minimize the risk, modern ventilators control for the highest inflation pressure ( peak inspiratory pressure), the lowest pressure ( end- expiratory pressure) and mean/ average airway pressure.
Additionally, since diseased areas of the lung require more time for gas exchange ( both oxygen-in and carbon dioxide- out ) the timing of inflation/inspiration and deflation/expiration must be controlled very carefully.
There are many terms for all those features and controls leading to many names for different types/ patterns of mechanical ventilation, but the essential considerations are as outlined.
Suffice to say that blindly squeezing a rubber bag and forcing oxygen into a very sick patient with very diseased lungs is an obvious setup for disaster.
