Pneumonia Care, Oxygen Requirements and Discharge (Part 4)

After spending almost 48 hours in the private ward, the following morning, we turned the oxygen down to 2L which I felt very comfortable with and my saturations remained 94% the majority of the day. In the evening, I asked to reduce it to 1L overnight but because they were still borderline, they were reluctant, understandably. It ended up getting turned down to 1L in the morning and then when the consultant came round for ward round, she turned it off completely. It had only been 3 hours and I had already started to struggle with my breathing again but she didn't seem to care. 


She came back into the room less than 30 minutes later, checked by saturations and they were 94% so basically said I was fit to go home which did not feel good. Especially, given what had happened last time. I knew it would still be a little while before I could go home as I had to ait for medications and things, but I also said my mum had just gone back to Leeds as yesterday the doctor had said it would be Friday. She said that's fine and I was fine to be home alone, which I was pretty shocked at to be honest. 


As the day went on, they kept doing my observations regularly and my saturations were pretty much consistently 92 - 93% the entire day. As it got towards tea time, they said I would need to stay in which was expected, but I was a little unsure why they hadn't restarted the oxygen. They made out it would need to be consistently 91% or lower again, which is strange to me but nevertheless. 



Overnight, my oxygen levels were 94% on my toes, but 93% or less on my fingers. Of course, the latter wasn't documented and so they said my levels were normal. Bare in mind, my heart rate was still consistently above 110bpm and that's whilst I was sleeping and lying down. I wasn't the happiest. I thought they would do my observations again in the morning but at 0900, the nurse rudely came in and asked when I was going home. Well, no one had told me a could go home and no one had given me my paperwork so... 

I was very frustrated but quickly called my mum and asked her to pick me up. I got dressed and packed, then as my mum arrived, I was pretty much ready to leave and we made a quick exit. They gave me my medication, discharge paperwork, sick note and a card so that if I was struggling at home, I could come straight back to the unit rather than going through A+E which was at least somewhat reassuring. 

When I got home, I was absolutely shattered and just wanted to sleep. Sadly, for the first time ever, my neighbour was incredibly loud. Someone decided to cut down a load of trees which took hours, there was a loud dog barking and to top things off, my mum literally could not sit still and was doing everything in her power to make noise downstairs. At least I was in my own space. 

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