Port authority

Update (9:45pm): Paul's new port went in fine. He's pretty sore, but it didn't stop him from eating a great dinner, and going with me to rent a movie (not Nacho Libre). Thanks for your prayers today.

Paul scored a 10 on the Smile-o-meter when he got home yesterday. He was even all smiles early this morning when he had to get up to get on the road back to FW in order to get his new port placed today. I think he even was smiling when he was asleep. Discharge went fine, but took all day as usual. Paul ended up getting platelets, and we started him on a new drug called Zometa (you trollers can do more research); Zometa is a drug you can get off-study now and is used to arrest tumor development in the bones. Paul has always struggled with bone mets so we thought this low side-effect drug would be good to try. The only side effect has to do with calcium, so he has to chew three TUMS a day. I've done my homework on different kinds of ports; we will be placing a "Broviak" line today; this is different since it is simply a line placed under the skin into a veinous artery, and the tube stays in all the time hanging about 2-3 inches outside the skin for access. Paul is excited that he won't have to be accessed with a needle anymore. We can use this line for quite sometime, and it may reduce infection since he won't be getting reaccessed once a week. This minor surgery is scheduled for noon. I'll report an "all-clear" later today. We know you pray for us daily. (-: