Dotzour Family.com

Jan 15, 10:30 am:   I’ve been trying to think of some amazing new content to post, since Mom has so many web-watching well-wishers.  But fortunately, news from Mayo is pretty quiet.  Dad and I drove home yesterday.  Joey drove up to Mayo (and we saw him on the interstate!).  Maretta went to Madison with some friends yesterday, and she is returning to Mayo again today.  Mom took a bunch of long walks yesterday(she’s exploring the whole hospital floor).  She’s continuing to sip her Gatorade.  Her number of tubes continues to decrease, and amidst lots of naps, she’s begun knitting and sitting up more.  This morning Mom told me that she’s doing better and better and that she thanks everyone for their continued thoughts and support.
Uploaded a final installment of photos from Mayo including several of Mom I took on Saturday.

Jan. 14, 10:30 am: Mom is sitting up in her bed, wearing her new aqua sweater, and looking great.  She’s taken a nice long walk this morning, played with her little grandson as he played at the foot of her bed, and took a good nap.

Dr. Farnell, his resident Dr. Thompson, and medical student Eduardo Terra Lucas stopped by at 8 this morning (in their snazzy suits and ties as all Mayo doctors dress).  Dr. Farnell sounded really pleased with Mom’s recovery.  They’ve removed one of her IV drips, and she’s not taking much morphine these days.  Dr. Farnell said Mom could start on a liquid diet to see how her new intestinal system is working.  After not having anything to eat or drink since Tuesday noon (that’s 4 days!) I think she’s thinking that sipping something even if it’s just Gatorade might be nice.

We’re having a changing of the guard today.  Our friend Jack is flying his plane up to Rochester today to visit Mom.  Joe is driving up for the weekend.  Maretta is heading home for a day, Dad is heading home until Tuesday or Wednesday, and Andrew and I are heading home for the week.  At this point, we’re guessing that Mom might get discharged on the 21st.  Mom will have to heal without the ministrations of Dr. Andrew for the week.  But she’ll be back in his care when she returns to Madison.  I’m kind of sad to be leaving.  Things have gone so well during our time here.

Between all the great news we’ve received and spending time with my family, it’s almost been fun!  While I’m away, I’ll get updates from those who are here, and I’ll continue to post reports on Mom’s recovery.

Mom sends her profound thanks to everyone for their prayers and good wishes.

Jan. 13, 3:00 pm: Mom came up with the title of this post for me.  Michael, Maretta, Andrew, Mom, and I are all hanging out in Mom’s room.  Andrew is lying at the foot of Mom’s bed and is currently plying with her hospital bracelets.  He’s coo-ing and goo-ing and his little fingers are wiggling around in the air.
Mom has taken three walks so far today.  All increasing in distance.  She’s not using the walking support that she used yesterday, and she is smilng quite a bit.  (But NOT laughing.  It is not nice to make someone who has just had abdominal surgery laugh!)  This morning when Dr. Thompson came by, he said Mom didn’t need to be on oxygen any more.  He also OK’d moving her three IVs from her arms to her groshong.  Having lots less tape and tubes on her arms helps!  Maretta rubbed lotion on Mom’s hands and arms to get any residual tape off.
An oncologist came in this morning and talked to Mom and Dad.  They are going to set up an appointment when they come back to Mayo for her follow-up appointment.
Mom is still sleeping and resting lots.  I spent a while today reading her many of the emails people have sent her (in care of me) over the last few days.  I’ve had several people ask about what Mom’s mailing address is. Click on “read more” to access it.  Like she said, she is “galloping to recovery!”  Thanks for your continued concern:)

Margot Babler
St. Mary’s Hospital
Patient Care Unit – Francis 2C
1216 Second Street SW
Rochester, MN 55902

5:35 pm: After two walks and lots of resting, we are all celebrating the 24 hours post-surgery mark.  She surprised us all by taking Andrew and holding him this morning.  Just a little while ago, she was up and sitting in a chair in her room.  So we all think she is doing wonderfully.  Pain management is going alright…Mom said she feels like it’s the day after major surgery.  She has three IVs and assorted other tubes and items connected to her (I count 11!), and I think she is more than ready for at least some of those to go away.  She is a great patient, though. Hopefully all the walking she did today will help speed healing and make some of the tubes and tape and wires unnecessary.
Terry, Tom, and Joey are driving home this evening.  That’ll leave me and Dad and Michael and Maretta here (oh, and Andrew too) on Friday.  I’m so glad to be able to continue to report that Mom is doing well.  In fact, she is doing great!

Jan. 12 at 10:10 am: It’s 18 hours after her surgery, and Mom continues to do well.  She’s been sleeping lots, which is what her body needs right now.  Dad stayed with her through the night, and he said she did well.  They mostly slept amidst the hourly check-ups by the nursing staff.

This morning at 9 am Dr. Farnell and company came in to see Mom.  Dr. Farnell said the surgery went as well or better than he had hoped.  He said they were able to completely remove the tumor and that Mom’s condition is good.  They removed two lymph nodes during the surgery, and both of them came back negative for cancer.  Yay!!

They transfused three units of blood while she was in surgery, so today I’m thinking about finding a place to donate blood to help someone else.

I asked Dr. Farnell if he encountered difficulty with the collateral veins that we had heard about from Dr. Matzke.  Dr. Farnell said that he didn’t see any big collateral veins near the SMV, and apparently they weren’t an issue during surgery.  It’s really amazing that all the concerns and issues that the surgeons were concerned about haven’t proved to be problems.

The nurses came by a bit ago and said they were going to get Mom up for a walk.  Yikes!  I doubt that will be a good experience for Mom.  All on the road to making her feel better, though.

And that’s the news for now…   ~Althea

8:15 pm: Dr. Farnell just came in to talk to us.  He’s a wonderful man; perhaps my favorite person today.  He said Mom’s surgery went really well, and it was great to see that he was pleased with how it went.  Mom was very coherent and asked him several questions.  After he left, she said she felt like she could do the splits, but maybe not today:)
Dr. Farnell said that he was able to preserve the Superior Mesenteric Vein (SMV).  He said that the tumor went right up to the vein but that they were able to peel it away.  This is terrific news, because some of the CT scans Mom had looked like the tumor invaded the vein. At four centimeters in diameter, the tumor was larger than ones that Dr. Farnell normally removes.  He said it was definitely cancer.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, they found microscopic cancer cells right up to the edge of the piece they took out.  That means that there may be some microscopic cancer cells left along the SMV.
However, Dr. Farnell didn’t seem too concerned about this, and he said that follow-up chemotherapy may help.  He’s going to set Mom up with an appointment with a Mayo oncologist in the next few days.
Dr. Farnell sounded happy with the surgery.  He said he’ll be back in at 8 am tomorrow to reiterate what he said tonight in case Mom doesn’t remember it.  For now, the kids and Terry and Tom and I are heading back to the hotel to order some pizza and to sleep.  Dad will stay here at the hospital with Mom.
Thanks to everyone who has been thinking of Mom today.  At noon today there were over 100 people checking this website.  Most of the rest of the day there’s been close to 50.  It’s really amazing to know that there are that many people directing their good wishes her way.  Thanks so much, and good night!
~Althea

6:50 pm: Mom’s been in her room for about two and a half hours now.  She was thrilled to hear that they were able to remove the tumor, and she’s been drifting between consciousness and sleep.

Drugs are going to be good friends for the next week or so, and she is going to have some major recovering to do…  But it feels so good to hold her hand and to hear her talk and answer questions and then to watch her sleep.  We’re waiting to hear from Dr. Farnell sometime in the next couple hours.  At that time, we should have more details about the surgery and her expected recovery process.  Dad is going to stay on a cot in her room tonight, and we’ve worked out a schedule with family members to make sure that she will have someone with her for her whole recovery here in Rochester.  Michael and Joey are napping, Bryan and Kyle are putting together puzzles, and we’re all swapping in to sit with Mom.  The big news though, is that Andrew fell asleep and is snoozing in his car seat right now.  Hopefully he’ll stay asleep for the night (but that might be pushing my luck)!  Next update after we hear from Farnell.

4:35 pm: As we watch, mom is being wheeled down the hall and in to her room.  She’s sound asleep and looks OK.  We all
gathered in the hallway to watch her get wheeled past.  So surgery is complete, she’s out of recovery, and she must be doing pretty well as they’re already putting her in her patient room.  Wow.
The surgery is over.

Jacquie said that Dr. Farnell would come to talk to us after his surgeries are over for the day.  She estimated that at between seven and nine pm this evening.  I’ll post at that point, but for now we can say that she is safely out of surgery.  Now she has a long recovery and healing process.  Thanks so much to all who have been watching and praying for her today.  I’ve posted a few more photos of us hanging out for those who like a little visual diversion…
~Althea

3:00 pm: Jacquie, Dr. Farnell’s nurse just came in to tell us that the surgeons are done with the Whipple Procedure, and they are moving on to closing her up.  So the really complicated part is done, and the next phase, that of closing her up, is expected to take about an hour and a half.  If that is how long it takes, she should be out of surgery at about 4:30 pm.  Then she’ll be in the recovery area for about two hours.  So we may see her here in her patient room around 7 pm.

Jacquie said that they are not expecting to have to admit Mom into Intensive Care, and they said that they didn’t have to mess too much with the Superior Mesenteric Vein.  Good news, as that was going to increase her chance of the SMV clotting, plus it would have increased surgery time significantly.

Jacquie also had some updates on the report from pathology.  They said that when they looked at the outer-most covering of the removed tumor (the margins) under a microscope, they did find some cancer cells.
That means that a) the tumor probably was cancerous despite our fervent hope that it wasn’t cancer at all and b) there may be some microscopic cancer cells that they left behind. Jacquie said that this is usually the case with pancreatic tumor removal, and she said that Dr. Farnell would be able to tell us more.

So mostly really good news today. I will post again when we hear that the surgery is  complete.  Mom sounds like she’s doing well so far.
I’m so glad that they have been able to get the tumor out!

1:30 pm: We just got a phone call from Anne, our current Patient Communicator.  She said that they were working on the last anistomosis (connection between organs).  Anne didn’t have any information about what the report from pathology was, but it sounds like they are nearing completion of the Whipple Procedure.  And at this point, it’s sounding like they didn’t have to reconstruct the SMV.
Mom has been in surgery for about five hours, and she’s doing well.  Mom, we’re so proud of you!