Stones, Part II

Saturday morning!  I’m up and taking in a soccer match, and I’m having a light breakfast of cottage cheese and a waffle.

The kidney pain returned.

For the third day in a row.

I texted my sisters about which hospital ER I need to go to under my health plan.  They texted back that I should call a nurse on my health insurance card, and that I should ask about urgent care.

A phone call later, and texts from one sister that she’d be over to pick me up, and I was on my way to UCSF’s urgent care.

It took a couple of hours, but I finally saw a doctor, after giving a urine sample.  She confirmed that I had a kidney stone (blood in urine) and had me have a blood draw to check that everything was fine.  She also prescribed flomax for my condition.

An hour later, I found out that it wasn’t, my creatinine levels were high compared to a recent test in July.  So I was sent across the street to the hospital’s emergency room for an IV to try to get those levels down, and to get a CT scan on my kidneys.

The waiting room time was about 4 hours, and then another hour or so lying on a hospital bed in the hallway near the CT scan room.

I was given a saline drip, then brought in for the scan, and then got a shot of toredol in my IV.

I finally had the doctor arrive to tell me what was up, that the stone should pass on it’s own.  She gave me a prescription for some other pain med (which I may not need) and this time they gave me a strainer and sample container for the stone when it passes.

After I was discharged my other sister picked me up and we picked up some cranberry juice and chicken broth from Safeway.  That’s when I remembered that I forgot to pick up my multi-tool from the security desk, which was confiscated when I arrived to the waiting room.

We went back to pick it up, then went home, where my sister prepared some of the broth and cranberry juice for me.

I feel fine now, probably better once I get the new prescription.

Thanks again to my sisters who I never listen to about health matters, until it does matter.