<\/a>of the pleural space and any air or fluid that was there. When they felt things were enough on the up-tick, he was again released to the main floor to continue recovery!<\/p>\n\n\n\nSince then, it’s been a whirlwind of echo’s, labs, weaning him off all I.V. meds, transitioning to pill form, and continuing to meet with OT and PT and the doctors to prepare for his imminent return home…likely Monday, 9\/8!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jim and I have been doing “training” – meeting with the heart team to go over all the details of what-to-do-if’s, discussing future appointments and how that works, expectations for living with a new heart, etc… We’ll have another training session with them tomorrow. As well, we met with the pharmacist to go over all his current meds he’ll be going home on. Currently there are about 13 total, including anti-rejections meds (x2), blood pressure, aspirin, immunosuppressants, etc… Jim and I will be doing what they call a “room-in” with Ethan tomorrow night through Saturday night. This will be a 24 period where we (Ethan\/Jim\/myself) will be in charge of managing the timing of meds…calling in the nurse who will hand them off throughout the day as we call. This is just part of the protocol…we are pretty familiar with meds!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today we met with nutrition, since there are several things Ethan won’t be able to have, and many things he’ll have to be very cautious about eating. For example…no more cold turkey sandwiches…lunch meat has to be heated up. He also can’t have blue cheese\/gorgonzola, etc. No grapefruit\/juice. If he wants roasted peanuts or similar, he can’t have them in the shell, they have to be shelled, or taken out of the shell and roasted fully. He can’t have most fermented items, but can have, for example, sauerkraut if pasteurized… This is just a sampling of the changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Right now, Ethan is and has been very much ready to come home…he’s looking forward to sleeping in his own bed and not being poked and prodded by hospital staff…although very wonderful and caring staff they are!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thank you again for following along on Ethan’s journey, and all the well wishes, prayers, and everything else!! We’re all doing relatively well, all things considered…mostly just tired! We look so forward to having Ethan home again!! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Good evening all… I’ve been meaning to write another update since Ethan’s trip back to the ICU…but things have been busy…in all good ways!! Ethan was in the ICU overnight and into the next afternoon. His dressings on the wound for the final chest tube were re-dressed a few times, to be sure there was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2254,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
Elaine's Ethan update from 9\/4\/25 - COTA for Team Ethan<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamethan\/2025\/09\/09\/elaines-ethan-update-from-9-4-25\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Elaine's Ethan update from 9\/4\/25\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Good evening all… I’ve been meaning to write another update since Ethan’s trip back to the ICU…but things have been busy…in all good ways!! Ethan was in the ICU overnight and into the next afternoon. 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