Nothing Runs Like a Deere

The following are excerpts from www.pulltight.blogspot.com. As one of our relatives wrote to me “just what you need when you are about to turn 80 is to get run over by a tractor”.

Terry

FRIDAY, APRIL 07, 2006
Nothing Runs Like a Deere

Yesterday while working in Fort Worth, I received a call there was an accident on the farm and Dad was on his way by Careflight helicopter to Harris Medical Center. He had been in a tractor accident. I was in the parking lot next door and came directly to the ER.

As I arrived at the ER, I received a call from my brother in law, Ken. It seems that while Mom and Dad were moving hay from a field to near their house, Dad was run over by the tractor. Being the first to the ER, a security guard escorted me to a family room and immediately one of the hospital chaplains came to see me. He had just come from seeing Dad. He said Dad was alert and on his way for a CT scan. He told Dad he would pray for him and he said Dad thanked him. I refrained from telling the Chaplin of the study just completed about prayer. It seems that patients who know they are prayed for in fact may have more complications than patients that do not know.

Mom gave me the story of what happened………… They were through loading the truck using the tractor to lift the large round bales of hay. Mom was going to drive the tractor back to the house, about a two-mile trip. Dad came over and stood between the front and rear wheels to put the tractor in road gear with Mom seated on the tractor. The tractor immediately lurched forward. Either the clutch was not engaged or it immediately disengaged. Dad was knocked beneath the rear wheel. Mom stopped the tractor within a few feet and came back to Dad.

Dad sat up and then lay back on the grass. The nearby road was very lightly traveled so Mom got back on the tractor to go home and call 911, about two miles at around 15 mph. When she was almost home, she managed to stop some gas field workers to call 911. When the EMS came, they immediately called for Careflight based on the possibility of internal or head injuries.

The paramedics asked Dad if he had ever ridden in a helicopter. “No, but I built them for 24 years.” He later remarked that his first helicopter ride was pretty rough.

When I first saw Dad, his head above and around his right eye looked as if part of a softball had been inserted beneath the skin and then painted various shades of purple, red and blue. His right ear, which was badly injured, was heavily bandaged. The actual injuries consisted of, in addition to the ear, a fractured skull, broken ribs on both sides of his chest, a broken collarbone and quite a few bruises and abrasions. Later that night he was doing well enough that he and the plastic surgeon listened to the baseball game as his ear was being repaired.



This is now two days later and he is doing pretty well. No internal or brain injuries have surfaced to this point. He is in the Trauma ICU, but it seems pretty much for observation only. The ribs are sore and his head around his right eye is swollen and discolored. He has many small abrasions and bruises. His ear looks pretty much like an ear again. The single piece of cartilage in his ear was in about 30 pieces before the reconstruction. He is getting a couple of units of blood today because his hemoglobin remains low.

He thinks he will get out of the ICU today and probably out the hospital in a couple of days. That seems overly optimistic, but maybe when the medical staff realizes he needs to finish moving the hay, they will expedite his release. Probably not.

Nothing makes you appreciate the fragility of life like hanging out a couple of days around the ER and ICU units of a trauma center. We are hopeful that Dad will have a complete recovery, but I look around and see the other families and patients with lives forever changed.


SATURDAY, APRIL 08, 2006
ICU
Dad was up sitting in a chair in his ICU room this morning. The main concern for the time is preventing pneumonia, the most likely severe complication. He is getting regular food (maybe that is overstating hospital food), although his appetite is not good. He is starting on a nutritional drink today (even worse than hospital food). As his appetite gets better, we will bring in food.

Mom and I looked at his chest X-Rays with the ICU nurse this morning. You can see the increased congestion in his lungs today as opposed to when he arrived at the hospital on Wednesday. It is good his lungs are as clear as they are, but he still may not avoid going on a ventilator for a few days. We also learned that there are more fractures than we initially thought. He has fractures in his shoulder in addition to his collarbone.

By looking at the X-Rays, I would guess the tractor knocked him down. The rear wheel went up his right side breaking ribs laterally. The wheel continued over his shoulder breaking his collarbone and shoulder, then over the side of his head fracturing his skull, and damaging his ear. There is a bruise on his forehead matching the tread of the tractror tire. Mom seems sure the tractor went over him and this seems the most likely scenario based on his injuries.

Last night when I was in the room with him, he was concerned about this year’s hay crop and who could take care of farming operations for him short term. Once you are a farmer or rancher you are always a farmer or rancher. I remember an interview with an older farmer a few years ago. He was asked what he would do if he won a $1,000,000 in the lottery. His answer “Well, I guess I could afford to keep farming.”


SUNDAY, APRIL 09, 2006
ICU continued
Dad is really down today. Perhaps it is a combination of his age, the pain and the medications. His vital signs all look good and his lungs are slightly better per the ICU nurse, but that isn't doing anything to lift his spirits. He is being started on meds that should make him feel better. More later.


MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2006
Dad update - ups and downs
The meds helped Dads perspective on life by Sunday evening and he is again thinking he going to recover. Sunday night his heart rate went to the 170s, but with the cardiologist recommended treatment Monday evening it was back to normal. The main short term concerns are keeping his lungs clear and correcting a low sodium. He was up taking a very few steps today and will be again tomorrow. He is probably looking at quite a few more days in ICU.

TUESDAY, APRIL 11, 2006
Dad update
Just talked to Mom and Sharon. Dad's heart rate seems to be in control today. And he ate some breakfast this morning after eating almost nothing yesterday. His primary Dr from the ER, said he will be using a walker today.

He will be getting salt tablets to increase his Sodium. I remember when athletes and manual labor workers used to take them before sports drinks were available.


WEDNESDAY, APRIL 12, 2006
Dad 041206
I spent the night at the hospital last night with Dad and Mom; my sisters have spent the other nights and that has been very good for Mom. Mom hasn’t left the hospital for more than an hour in the last week. Dad seemed uncomfortable and restless most of the night. He is getting more aggressive respiratory treatments starting today. These will sometimes involve a nasal tube. The goal is still keeping him off a ventilator. The report this afternoon - he was not nearly as restless after a change in the pain medications and he took a few steps aided by a walker. Still no word on when he might move from ICU


FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 2006
Dad 4/14/06
Dad seemed much better yesterday and this morning. Lung cultures are still negative, Sodium is back within normal range and vital signs look good. He is much more like himself after changes in medication. He smiled at a couple of bad jokes by the ICU nurse and me. Mom is going home for a few hours today for the first time since the accident. He is still in ICU, but we are optimistic he will be in a room soon.


SUNDAY, APRIL 16, 2006
Continued Progress
Sunday 4/16/06

Dad entertained Austin and me, yesterday, with stories from his Navy experiences in the 40s. He continues to improve. His doctor this morning told us, he may go to a regular room today, depending on one set of lab results and the availability of a bed (hospital is really full). It will be good to see him escape ICU.

Mom has become the matriarch of the ICU waiting room. I think she knows every patient's story and all of their visiting family members. The other families will miss her when she and Dad go another part of the hospital.


TUESDAY, APRIL 18, 2006
Home Soon
Dad continues to improve rapidly considering the extent of his injury. He will possibly be coming home in the next 2-3 days. He is walking around the hospital floor with minimal assistance, with a walker that he is actually not using. All his tubes, IV lines and oxygen were removed today. I jokingly suggested to him, he should work with the physical therapist on stepping high enough to get on a farm tractor.



THURSDAY, MAY 18, 2006
Tractor

Dad is recovering nicely with no complication except it was discovered last week he has a broken leg. He complained that it began to hurt after walking. An X-ray was ordered and yep it is broken. The tractor here is the one from the accident.


WEDNESDAY, JUNE 07, 2006
Nothing Runs Like a Deere, Revisited
I guess no one who knows Dad and has seen him make such a rapid recovery from his accident (see entry Nothing Runs Like a Deere), will be surprised. Monday, two days shy of two months since his accident and two weeks short of his 80th birthday, Dad was back on one of his farm tractors.