Meeting the Doctor

Today we met Dr. Fernando Cantu for the first time. I'm already feeling encouraged. He came to our hotel room because Elana can't get out of bed today. We spoke with him mostly in general terms about what lies ahead the next few weeks. Tomorrow he is coming back to the hotel to discuss more specifics and will spend private time with Elana as well. I believe he is a talented and capable doctor, BUT I KNOW he is a warm and caring person after spending an hour with him.

Earlier this morning my mother and I visited the Hospital San Jose to get a tour of the ICU (where she will be during the coma) and the patient rooms (where she will be post-coma). I can say without a doubt this is the NICEST, CLEANEST & FRIENDLIEST hospital I have ever been to. You can eat off the floors and the patient room is bigger than our hotel room. While this won't apply to us, they even have a flat screen tv in the waiting area that monitors the progress of surgeries so that the families of the patients can know the status of the surgery (ie: 30%, 50%, 90% etc.).

I have attached a link to the website where you can read about and watch videos of all of the Coma patients, including Elana. http://rsdfoundation.org/en/hellring.htm

We all know that Elana is in bad shape, yet today we met the mother of 22 year old girl from New York who, if you can believe it, is in much worse shape. Jessica Stevens developed RSD when she was 11 after a bout with mono. She was able to get the RSD into remission with physical therapy. Several years later she developed lyme disease after she was bit by a tick. That caused the RSD to come back much worse than before. She has been in the hospital in Monterrey for FIVE MONTHS! After the coma she has had many complications because of the lyme disease. While I feel that we have gotten more than our fair share of perspective since this all began, I guess a little more can't hurt.

Lance