Help Mike & Donna Medical Expenses
Donation protected
On November 13th 2017, Mike went to the doctor after a bad fever, severe shakes and chills during the night. Theses shakes had him biting the inside of his cheek and tongue, and bouncing around on the bed, irritating his arthritic back injuries. The second night was worse, fighting the fever almost an hour till additional meds slowed it down. Third night it was over an hour and included at the end, violent vomiting.
At the doctor again the next day, blood work was done, finding white cell count was elevated, so they administered two massive 1 gram shots of a powerful antibiotic, and asked him to come back the next day for another white cell count blood test.
As the fourth night started he woke up around 1am with the start of shakes and took ice water on wash clothes and wiped himself down as needed for almost 5 hours keeping the shakes and fever mostly under control getting back to bed around 6am.
Feeling more and more weak and having difficulty getting dressed, he eventually made it to the clinic but was unable to walk into the clinic unaided. The doctor came out and upon seeing him, rushed him to the small local hospital.
Mike had a bad AFIB with a heart rate near 200 beats a minute, plus extreme sweating and fever. The small local ER staff setup a heart monitor then an IV and on the third attempt, chemically stopped Mike's heart for a few seconds. This brings it down into the 80s but still in AFIB, making him weak. They took him by ambulance to a big regional hospital as the small one did not have the needed equipment.
In the Emergency Department at the big hospital and then admitted to a cardiac care wing with 24 hour heart monitoring. After coming in for a bad AFIB heart problem and what turned out to be a serious infection of his liver Mike was hospitalized 30 days and was on IV antibiotics 4 times a day (two different types twice a day). The doctors removed an abscess from the liver, drained and cleaned the area, installed a drain line, and did a biopsy. Then 10 days later when the results of the biopsy did not show a particular bug, they did another liver biopsy and also drained 950ml of fluid from the left lung. When it appeared that Mike and his wife (who stayed by his side throughout this 30 days, would not only spend Thanksgiving in the hospital but possibly Christmas as the infectious diseases doctor wanted to do a 42 day run of antibiotics by IV, they found and used a fancy antibiotic that had one IV bag, and lasts for approximately three weeks. This replaced the more complicated one Mike was on, which required daily blood work to control its levels in his body. Then it was possible for him to go home, provided he went every day for 21 days to the small local hospital for IVs of the other less critical antibiotic. Then after those 21 days, Mike started 30 days of two different oral antibiotics twice a day - 4 pills of antibiotics a day, plus double his original heart pressure medicine and 3 new ones each day.
They also took him off of all NSAID type pain meds, so his back is still having trouble for him get around normally.
Mike has no health insurance. He was a few months away from Medicare coverage and the last time he was hospitalized was for 2 days over 35 years ago to finish recovering from pneumonia. He could not afford health insurance with his social security income and was hoping to get to 65 without any major problems.
So we are hoping to raise money here to help pay the costs involved. The guest meals alone for his wife Donna were nearly 300 dollars that they needed to put on other normal bills. When something like this happens your normal life is very out of the normal ranges. Your help will allow us to get some measure of normalcy back, and be able pay something on these bills - now totaling over 160,000 dollars. The amount shown is the current total amount as it has come in at this time (Jan 23rd). It could rise further if more bills come in. Fortunately the local hospital and doctor help is being covered by a county indigent fund, and an effort to do that with some of the main bills is underway, but there are now follow-up visits for one of the specialists in Abilene coming up in February where his office requests 150$ as a deposit to even see him for this visit and requires the balance to be paid that day. This may be over 200 dollars before being allowed to see the doctor and Mike is concerned how to do this and pay the regular bills such as utilities and groceries.
Please give only if you can, any amount would be appreciated, no matter how small. Thank you and God Bless you. All prayers are also appreciated.
At the doctor again the next day, blood work was done, finding white cell count was elevated, so they administered two massive 1 gram shots of a powerful antibiotic, and asked him to come back the next day for another white cell count blood test.
As the fourth night started he woke up around 1am with the start of shakes and took ice water on wash clothes and wiped himself down as needed for almost 5 hours keeping the shakes and fever mostly under control getting back to bed around 6am.
Feeling more and more weak and having difficulty getting dressed, he eventually made it to the clinic but was unable to walk into the clinic unaided. The doctor came out and upon seeing him, rushed him to the small local hospital.
Mike had a bad AFIB with a heart rate near 200 beats a minute, plus extreme sweating and fever. The small local ER staff setup a heart monitor then an IV and on the third attempt, chemically stopped Mike's heart for a few seconds. This brings it down into the 80s but still in AFIB, making him weak. They took him by ambulance to a big regional hospital as the small one did not have the needed equipment.
In the Emergency Department at the big hospital and then admitted to a cardiac care wing with 24 hour heart monitoring. After coming in for a bad AFIB heart problem and what turned out to be a serious infection of his liver Mike was hospitalized 30 days and was on IV antibiotics 4 times a day (two different types twice a day). The doctors removed an abscess from the liver, drained and cleaned the area, installed a drain line, and did a biopsy. Then 10 days later when the results of the biopsy did not show a particular bug, they did another liver biopsy and also drained 950ml of fluid from the left lung. When it appeared that Mike and his wife (who stayed by his side throughout this 30 days, would not only spend Thanksgiving in the hospital but possibly Christmas as the infectious diseases doctor wanted to do a 42 day run of antibiotics by IV, they found and used a fancy antibiotic that had one IV bag, and lasts for approximately three weeks. This replaced the more complicated one Mike was on, which required daily blood work to control its levels in his body. Then it was possible for him to go home, provided he went every day for 21 days to the small local hospital for IVs of the other less critical antibiotic. Then after those 21 days, Mike started 30 days of two different oral antibiotics twice a day - 4 pills of antibiotics a day, plus double his original heart pressure medicine and 3 new ones each day.
They also took him off of all NSAID type pain meds, so his back is still having trouble for him get around normally.
Mike has no health insurance. He was a few months away from Medicare coverage and the last time he was hospitalized was for 2 days over 35 years ago to finish recovering from pneumonia. He could not afford health insurance with his social security income and was hoping to get to 65 without any major problems.
So we are hoping to raise money here to help pay the costs involved. The guest meals alone for his wife Donna were nearly 300 dollars that they needed to put on other normal bills. When something like this happens your normal life is very out of the normal ranges. Your help will allow us to get some measure of normalcy back, and be able pay something on these bills - now totaling over 160,000 dollars. The amount shown is the current total amount as it has come in at this time (Jan 23rd). It could rise further if more bills come in. Fortunately the local hospital and doctor help is being covered by a county indigent fund, and an effort to do that with some of the main bills is underway, but there are now follow-up visits for one of the specialists in Abilene coming up in February where his office requests 150$ as a deposit to even see him for this visit and requires the balance to be paid that day. This may be over 200 dollars before being allowed to see the doctor and Mike is concerned how to do this and pay the regular bills such as utilities and groceries.
Please give only if you can, any amount would be appreciated, no matter how small. Thank you and God Bless you. All prayers are also appreciated.
Organizer
Mike Nichols
Organizer
Knox City, TX
