to peg or not to peg interests me more and more. at my age/if this were me, that peg would have gone in, but my dad would not even consider it. he is now on his 3rd hospital stay, this time he does have pneumonia...confusing as he didn't have it, then he did, "sounds" like he did, may have had it and it cleared up...argh! so now he HAS IT and got discharged WITH IT and feels great. go figure.

but i digress, so many opinions re the peg from different drs during this journey. his CCC drs called me late friday to suggest he may require "alternative feeding methods" which my dad would not hear of. the skinny appears to be, whether you tube or not, you still can get pneumonia, and if you can swallow, then not having a tube is the better option. these are unscientific findings as they are our opinion, but he is still swallowing strong in his final week of treatment, we are trying to be as careful as possible keeping him from aspiration which is where the pneumonia problems come from. i've actually documented and graphed his blood counts and gagging episodes and there is indeed a pattern to his ER visits when his, 1) white count is down, 2)he's had issues with mucous and this tends to make him swallow "wrong", 3)gagging/breathing in large amounts of air and mucous, 4) temperature spikes are higher when his white count is lower. AGAIN, unscientific and your mileage may vary. finally met with a seasoned ER doctor who understood they were treating an in-treatment cancer vs. just a pneumonia patient, and that made the last ER episode and hospital stay much more efficient.

the last week of treatment we've been requesting/receiving more hydration sessions, as well as IV meds to dry mucous...only lasts a day or 2 but helps so much.

lastly, if you travel for treatment and use a local hospital for emergency situations, always bring your blood work reports, medication/dosing info and primary contacts. avoids much confusion, ours is now stored on my phone.

hope this is of value to someone reading this, as we're learning by doing!