  My dad had a 7:30 am doctor appointment, so I spent the night in LB so I wouldn't have to drive early through traffic. Jerel joined me really late after winning a poker game at work. My boyfriend loves me: he gave me half his winnings.
Isn't that sweet? Well, I know what it's for, so you can say it'll end up going back to him anyway, hahahaha! No, it's not what you think. Or is it? Anyway, I took my dad to Dr. Roth, where he hooked him up with a new glucose testing kit, and some more prescriptions.
We then went back to LB, where I tried to catch up on some more sleep. Jerel left for his ortho appointment (where he was half an hour late... but at least they still took him in), and then my dad and I went to his next appointment at the Wound Care Center in La Palma. I couldn't find parking! So I dropped my dad off while I parked far, far away. After I got in, I helped him fill out some forms, and then they called him in.
They took all kinds of measurements and tried to find a pulse in his feet. They couldn't find it right away, so they had to do an ultrasound. Luckily, there was a pulse. Another man was walking around, and when he peeked in and saw the wound, he exclaimed, "Oh yeah, we can fix that. " The doctor came in a bit later, where he began to cut away the top layer of dead skin. I know it was painful for my dad, but they had to do it.
I felt a tinsy bit queasy, but it was okay. They also took a culture (when I say culture, they actually took a little piece of my dad's flesh) to examine what kind of bacteria is breeding, and if they need additional antibiotics to kill them. So the treatment for the week is changing his dressing once a day. First the wound needs to be rinsed with a saline solution, then this cream needs to be applied directly into the wound. I forgot what it's called, but apparently it's a cream will eat the dead flesh and bacteria. But you also have to be careful 'cause it'll also eat good flesh, so the application needs to be right on.
Then some gauze is put on top, and some more dressings are wrapped around to keep it in place. Pretty simple, but man, that wound looks nasty. It IS better, at least. Most of the dried blood came off. But I can't believe a scrape could get that bad. Let that be a lesson to diabetics. Next week, we need to follow up and see how it's progressing. My dad didn't have much for breakfast, so we had lunch at The Loft, where he had some grilled chicken (I had kahlua pork and island-style fried chicken).
I'm worried though 'cause his glucose level came out to 251 before lunch (it should be at least below 140 for diabetics). So, afterwards, I dropped him off at home, where I went over how to change the dressing. I can't be there every morning do change it, so hopefully he'll do it correctly. Then I went to work. For you curious folks: I don't want to actually take pictures of my dad's wound, that just seems nasty to me.
But I've been reading up on ulcers (which is what he has) and if you want to see an example of what his wound looks like, look urlLink here , bottom of the page. His doctor said his wound is in Stage 3, but let me tell you, it looks like Stage 4. Don't you love doctor visits? 
