Wahlid Behnawa, returned a few hours later with a much different message. The oncologist left, unable to convince me and in his place a hospitalist, Dr. I had come to terms with them to the best of my ability through the course of my illness, accepting them as a necessary evil to be dealt with, but the trauma of my most recent hospital experience had left me panicky and hysterical at the thought of injections, blood draws, and biopsies. I have, from a young age, been deathly afraid of needles. I told him there had to be another way, another treatment, and that under no uncertain terms would I be self administering injections. I shook my head and held tears back, my breath escalating as I started to panic. My oncologist finally came to visit me and explained that the best thing for me was a series of injections of a drug called lovinox, beginning with two a day in the hospital and the remainder to be self administered in the belly once a day for 60 days. I had been pricked so often I would start to cry when I saw them coming my veins were full of scabs and it usually took 2 to 3 attempts to make it in for a good draw. Concerned with the clot in my lung, my doctors wanted blood samples every four hours. I was a mess of tubes with IVs in both arms and on occasion someone would misstep and tread on a line, yanking one of those needles out of my arms. I slept fitfully from the pain meds, I would wake in sheet soaked with sweat and we would wait sometimes hours for the assistant to return with fresh ones which we changed ourselves. My vitals, checkups, and concerns were attended to largely by CNAs many of whom spoke little english or simply never returned with the items we needed. For the patient, me, this meant I would see my nurse only to administer my IV meds. Auburn general like many hospitals has addressed its budget issues by forcing out its registered nurses in favor of less qualified medical professional assistants. The next four days were a slow blurry nightmare.
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