Merle's Success Story
After Merle’s wife, Paula, tells his story, he always says, "Do I remember any of that? Nope, none of it!”
- Merle
Merle went into the hospital for a routine hernia repair and was supposed to go home after a couple of days. However, as the nurse was going over his discharge instructions, Merle stopped breathing and had no pulse. He was successfully revived after two minutes and was transferred to the ICU. Merle remained intubated in the ICU, but after a week, his wife, Paula, received a call around 1am and was told he only had hours left to live.
It was suggested that she consider removing life support so he wasn’t suffering anymore. Paula called his family with this news and they came to say goodbye to Merle. Paula had been given this kind of news before with their son who was born about three months early and they were told he only had hours to live. Their son is now an adult and graduated at the top of his class from Bath High School.
The next day as the physicians were rounding, Paula explained she was not ready to stop Merle's life support. The medical team reassured her and stated there would be no need to do so because Merle was going to wake up and go home with her! When Merle came to Kindred Hospital Lima, he had a tracheostomy (trach), was eating only soft foods and was intermittently confused. He was receiving IV antibiotics, surgical incision care and therapies since he hadn’t been out of bed for a while. After a long battle and with support from his wife and family, Merle is walking with the use of a walker, has no trach, is back to eating regular foods and is completely coherent. Merle went home from Kindred with Paula, his high school sweetheart and wife of 51 years just like his doctors said he would.
Care for Complex Conditions
Patients come to our hospitals with serious conditions such as respiratory failure, complex wounds, sepsis, stroke, congestive heart failure, or even a combination of these. Their diagnoses are often complicated by existing health problems like diabetes or COPD. Many of our patients require treatments such as mechanical ventilators, dialysis, or IV therapy.