The Fever

A 104-degree fever; that's were I was. Vacillating between 101 and 104 degrees. My temperature was rising and falling depending on the length of time expended since my last dose  of medication.

A fever is an indication that there is an infection in your body. Until now, it had never occurred to me that doctors treat you for a fever without knowing where the infection is. They brought in an infectious disease specialist. This doctor is a specialist who tries to determine the cause of the infection and how best to treat it. I asked him what was wrong with me. He could not tell me. He decided on a course of action that would include powerful antibiotics.

I expected that after a couple of days the antibiotic would kick in and the fever would be gone and we would be back on schedule. Usually, when a doctor gave me an antibiotic, within a couple of days (if not sooner) I would begin to feel better. That’s not what happened this time; after the third day the antibiotics did nothing, They did a variety of tests over the next few days to try to determine what was causing the fever so they could better address it, but nothing was working.  Blood tests were continued, looking for results. They also did blood cultures, hoping to determine what was going on. Every day my growing list of doctors had a conference on my situation and conferred on what to do next.

The surgery was postponed indefinitely; until the fever was under control they could not operate. The surgery was scheduled to happen on the Wednesday after I had been admitted into the hospital. As a result of the fever, my original surgeon could not preform the surgery even at a later date as he had scheduled a personal vacation after my surgery. He recommended an associate. By the time they canceled the surgery, I was getting concerned. The fever had not subsided and now the surgery was postponed. We were back to the beginning, only on top of it there was now a fever to contend with. Now a surgeon I knew absolutely nothing about would be operating on me. More immediate to me was the fever - how long was it going to persist and how was it affecting my heart? Would a prolonged fever impact my heart negatively? What were they going to do to get it under control?

Unlike the heart surgeon, I was not getting any definitive answers from the doctors, probably because they really did not know what the heck was going on. My days and nights were spent sleeping and and the nursing staff were constantly monitoring me. The fever was a blessing in disguise; it gave my wife and family the opportunity to get the word out and have people start praying for me. I feel this is the most important thing that contributed to my recovery. God is good. The period of time I had that fever was the time I need to get people praying for me because what was coming was more than the doctors could handle. Though I had some great doctors, the truth is, they call it a medical practice because it is a practice. My doctors, as good as they were, simply did not have all the answers. For instance, they were never able to give me a definitive answer as to why I had developed a fever.

This first week was more or less static; my condition did not improve, nor did it deteriorate. Fortunately for me, my wife was constantly with me as were my children and my oldest daughter’s boyfriend. I had not had a hospital stay since I was 16 years old and much had changed, yet the simple things like visitors stayed the same and surprisingly to me, I found it helpful and comforting. Another thing that I found particularly helpful was the visits from the pastors of my church; I came to look forward to their visits. I stayed in the cardiac  wing of Florida Hospital South, also known as the Ginsberg building. The room was large for a hospital room; it had large windows that allowed you to see much of the west side of Orlando as well as the west side of Winter Park. The room was designed to allow visitors or family members to stay overnight if they desired; my wife did just that on more than one night. They told me (or I may have dreamed that someone told me) that on a clear night you could see the fireworks of Universal Studios or Disney. The view was actually quite nice, but it would be weeks before I could actually see it.

We made arrangements to meet with the new surgeon to discuss the surgery. I was concerned about it, but I was resigned to the fact that I really did not have much of a choice. Unless this man was overtly incompetent, he would be cutting me up. He entered my hospital room and I immediately noticed his smock; it read “Head of Heart Transplant Department”. I was immediately relived; my fever had provided me with an upgrade. I reasoned that he was probably the highest qualified surgeon in Central Florida to be preforming the surgery. Being the Head of the Heart Transplant Department, I felt he could handle my situation. However, my wife needed to hear him say that he could handle it . She asked several times if he was good and he tried to respond as humbly as possible that yes, he could handle it. She asked him again, “Are you really good?” and he finally responded in a way that reassured both of us. He said, “I am very good.” It was not so much what he said, but how he said it that satisfied our apprehensions. He displayed the confidence necessary to be successful at the operation.

He also did something that I would become very appreciative of - he was upfront and gave me the facts. He told me, “Ruben, I can fix your heart and make it as good as it’s going to be, but if you don't quit smoking and lose weight you will die soon.” I appreciated his candor, but he also had picked the two most difficult habits in my life to quit. He said something else that really impacted my mind. He said, "You are a relatively young man; in reasonably good shape I would rate your surgical survivability  at 98%".  At that moment I was happy with those odds. My brother, who is a general physician, once told me that the withdrawal symptoms for quiting smoking were about the same as for other additive drugs. I had tried to quit smoking many times, but I always failed. I had actually lost about 40 pounds a couple of years prior to my heart attack, so I was acutely aware of how difficult it would be to accomplish what had been recommended. However, at that moment I was more concerned with the immediate situation than I was about accomplishing those two things. I did not know it at that moment, but by the time I left the hospital both of those things would be accomplished.

My fever persisted; it was four days and no one had any idea what was causing the fever or what do to bring me back to normal. The specialist tried other medical combinations and still no difference; I still had a fever. Day after day it was the same thing: the nurse would come in and check vital signs, take blood and dispense medications. Early every morning it was x-rays and visits from the doctors. They had me hook up to every possible monitor they could think of, or at least I thought they did. Later in the afternoon, more checking of vital signs, more blood tests and more medications. By now I had four doctors looking in on me everyday - the infectious disease specialist, the general doctor, the cardiologist and the heart surgeon. By Friday I was experiencing what started out as an uncomfortable pain in my abdomen; as the day progressed, the pain did also. By the end of the day the pain was excruciating; they were giving pain killers, but they had very little affect.

They finally decided that the cause of the fever and the pain may have been caused by the heart pump and the pacemaker. They decided to remove the pump and the pacemaker.  Unfortunately, it was a procedure that only the cardiologist could perform and I had to wait for him to become available, which at the time seemed to be an eternity. The pain seemed to intensify with every moment that passed. He finally arrived and removed the pacemaker and pump. I was asleep as soon as he completed the removal; I don't know if it was a result of the drugs or fatigue. By the time I awoke the pain was gone. The fever was still an issue; the infectious disease specialist continued his procedures. Over the weekend the fever broke and we finally had set a date for the bypass surgery. It was now about a week since I had been admitted.