Hello Everyone,
Karen has been in hospital for 8½ months.
Karen continues to struggle with her ME particularly because of the stress and over exertion caused by the problems with East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust and St Marks hospital; and the hospital environment. One of Karen’s ME dips (flare ups) started late on Wednesday the 28th of August. It increased all her ME symptoms, including the pain and nausea and she was vomiting.
Karen’s urinary catheter needs to be changed each time by a urology consultant using specialised equipment. An arrangement had been made for this to be done on Friday the 30th but Karen was feeling too unwell with her ME dip to have it done then so it was postponed.
A patient in a room close to Karen has their radio on all day. It is too loud and disturbs Karen. It means she cannot rest or sleep properly and it is making her feel more exhausted and unwell. The radio noise has been a problem for K/aren for over a week.
It has been 3 months since Karen’s PEG-J balloon burst leaving the PEG-J tube unstable and unable to be used. Because the balloon has broken the PEG-J site is leaking gastric fluid, particularly during Karen’s ME dips - when her nausea is worse. The gastric fluid burnt the skin making it red and painful. We are using a barrier cream which helps.
Karen still needs remote setting up of home I/V feeding (PN) while she is in Conquest hospital. Even when she has a working PEG-J tube she cannot tolerate anywhere near enough PEG-J feed and water down the PEG-J tube to sustain her.
The 2nd video of Karen that we posted on X on the 15th of August, has had more than 61,000 views! Thanks for viewing and sharing it.
@TeamKarenGordon
https://x.com/teamkarengordon
Thank you so much to everyone who has signed and shared the petition. Also, thank you very much to everyone who has chipped in to promote the petition. It is very generous of you and it makes a big difference. Thank you for your supportive comments. It is all much appreciated by us.
Please keep sharing this petition and telling people about Karen’s situation.
Thank you to everyone for your support.
Best wishes to you all.
Karen, Heather & Michael