Another dressing change for Joe, this time at the local clinic. Again less traumatic because with each change the healing process has advanced and the wounds less painful I guess, having said that he was still screaming in pain and crying at one stage, but far less than last time and the level of pain was less evidently. I got another look at the whole thing and I'm still shocked at the size of the hole that it in his leg where the tear was. If I'd had my camera I reckon I'd have taken a picture of it because it is unbelievable. The nurse asked...
"Is he on pain killers"?
"No, not as a general rule, but prior to coming here we've given him some because we're aware that it hurts". She looked at me kind of in astoundment, I followed.... "Well, I sort of noticed that at the hospital after a few days, they only gave him the medicine when he said he was in pain"...
"Do you reckon looking at that, you'd not be in pain"?
"Yeah - I dunno, again at the hospital they got him to explain the pain on the basis of a 1 to 10 rating and generally he doesn't say that he's in pain". Again she looked at me in disbelief.
"I think there's no way that he's not in pain and that you should continue to give him the maximum dosage that is described on the bottle".
So on that point I agreed and the rest of today we've dosed him up with paracetamol and we're holding back the Ibrofen stuff for the occassions where he asks for pain-killers. These occurances happen usually at night and are 'Cast' related - pressure on his heel rather than wound related. But we'll see how it goes and see if notices any difference being dosed up all the time?
The next visit
This is Friday and will be at the hospital and as far as I'm aware they're going to Xray the leg again to check how it's fixing, they'll also dress the wound as well. Perhaps we'll have some news on whether this cast he's currently got that he can't move himself will come off and be replaced with a lighter resin cast?
Overall he's pretty chipper, singing and being the usual Joe, but stuck inside.
