[QUOTE=FeAudrey]
There are plenty of English/Spanish medical bi-lingual dictionaries available in U.S. bookstores. A Canadian bookstore might have a French/English one.
[/QUOTE]
That’s a great idea and I’ll look into it. I speak French and I have all my life but when the panic sets in it’s hard to know how to ask the doctor whether he’s using the saphenous vein or the internal mammary artery for the procedure, you know? I know quite a bit about medical stuff, but I learned it all in English.
Turns out it doesn’t matter anyway - she signed herself out. “I wanted to get my papers in order, and the doctor was a jerk” is the reason I was given. I suspect it’s more to do with fear and a need for a cigarette.
Surgery is tentatively scheduled for Feb 4 or 5. I’m heading up this weekend to help her get ready (emotionally, mostly) and will stay through the surgery. Luckily my employer is fine with me taking off for this. I’ll have to figure out the FMLA stuff, but that can happen later. The cruise my husband and I are booked on for February 9th is looking more and more unlikely, despite Mom’s threats to steal my passport and go in my place if I tell her I’m staying, so I need to call and see if we can at least get credit towards another cruise if we can’t go.
Update: she’s scheduled the surgery for Wednesday and I’m heading up tomorrow morning.
She’s asking me why they want her to get a bypass instead of a stent, and I just don’t know what to tell her. Everything I see online basically says it depends on the patient, which is obvious but not helpful. She sent me a picture of the diagram the doctor gave her, showing how blocked her heart is, but I don’t know how to interpret it. From left to right, the numbers by the highlighted areas are 60%, 30%, and 60%, with a “Bx 70%” off to the side. He said something about how if they stented the blocked area there would be too much blood going through and it might cause more heart attacks (I presume from dislodged clots). But… wouldn’t that be true for almost anyone?
Can anyone shed light on this so I can help Mom understand why they need to crack her open? I don’t need specific medical advice, and I will be trying to get it straight from the doctor once I’m there, but the language issue makes me nervous and I would really like to understand how the decision of “stent vs CABG” is made.