Hi everyone. This isn’t request for medical advice since the person involved is already on the way to the hospital, or is probably there already.
My sister’s husband worked out hard last night and, while spending the night at his mom’s house while she’s recovering from hip surgery, slept on an uncomfortable couch.
Today he woke up with bad pain in his back and numbness near his kidney (lower side… not sure which side). He’s in such pain that he called an ambulance and is on the way to Columbia Presbyterian now–probably there already. My sister’s also on her way.
My question to anyone who can help is… Is there anything this could be that’s not horrible? Both my sister and I are pessimists/worst-case-scenario thinkers, and her mind went to kidney cancer, mine went to a heart attack. (My brother-in-law had a heart attack at 24 from major stress/hypertension. He’s 46 now, in good health, no problems since.)
Could it be something less… awful? My hopiest hope is that it’s a pinched nerve–the numbness seems quite possible, especially the fact that he woke up with it worse after sleeping on a bad sofa. But I don’t know. Any thoughts? I’m scared. It’s not helped that today is the 29th anniversary of our mom’s death (she was only 58–lung cancer), so our thoughts are already morbid.
Thanks guys. Those are good options. Well. Not good, but you know what I mean. I forgot about slipped or herniated discs. The fact that it seems to have worsened overnight is also indicative, acc. to research on WebMD et al., which I should totally not be doing because that exacerbates my hypochondria.
Kidney stones would be ideal. (Again: not for him, but because they’re not nearly as serious.)
I can’t tell if not having heard from my sister is good news or bad. Sigh. I hate this. Matthew’s such a sweetheart.
Thanks again, you two. I appreciate your quick answers.
A pulled muscle in my back laid me out in excruciating pain for nearly a week. I’d guess it has a lot to do with working out and then sleeping on the couch. The best of luck to him.
The kidneys are higher than many people think. Both at least partially protected by the lower floating ribs. Still could be a kidney stone though or something musculoskeletal in the lower back.
I have my fingers crossed that it is nothing worse than a kidney stone.
My husband had one, and it was awful. He woke up in the middle of the night in excruciating pain, to the point that he was vomiting and at times too out of it to communicate. I had no idea what was going on, except that it was clearly an emergency.
Having experience a bad pulled muscle like Helena330, I wouldn’t be surprised at that. And having “hauled” my dad to the ER in the back of my SUV due to a herniated disc once, I wouldn’t be surprised at that either.
Oh man. Thank you guys so much. Holy shit this has been a difficult 3 hours or so. My sister “went dark” so to speak (i.e. no news) but I finally heard from her just now.
Well, as many of you mentioned, “kidney stones” seems to be heading in the right direction. (Not great phrasing, ouch.) Docs do indeed think kidney stones due to blood in urine / cat scan.
The numbness surprises me–that this would be a symptom of a stone. Why would that be, are they pressing on nerves or something? Is there swelling?
Anyway my sister’s still “wait and see.” I guess they aren’t sure yet. Do they do sonograms? X-rays? I would’ve thought a cat scan would tell them the answer. Honestly I do love my sister dearly but she isn’t super-great at asking questions about what tests are being taken and so on.
If it is kidney stone(s) I do feel sorry for him because yeah, I’ve heard they can be horrifically painful mofos.
Thank you all very very very much for the help and good wishes thus far. Obviously I’m still concerned until I get the definite diagnosis but I do feel better.
Another update. The catscan couldn’t find any stones so they think he might have passed it. But he’s still in a lot of pain and his kidneys are “working overtime.” Now I’m back to being scared. They’re admitting him.
I’ve had kidney stones and, while I’m quite glad to have survived the experience, in the moment I’d rather have died than continue being in that level of extreme pain. He may have a kidney infection, which are also quite painful. Nothing you can do but be supportive until he’s diagnosed, I’m afraid. Don’t let your inner hypochondriac out around the guy though, that doesn’t help anyone.
Oh I won’t, thanks Rachellogram. Outside of my initial concern that it might have been his heart (which they ruled out first apparently), I was doing nothing but expressing optimistic thoughts to try to calm my sister down. And I’m so sorry to hear you had kidney stones too, they just sound like a nightmare.
Well we have a new diagnosis and… not kidney stones, but something called “Rhabdo” or Rhabdomyolysis, which is apparently something found in Crossfit athletes and earthquake disaster victims (!!!).
Matthew got almost no pain relief from the morphine, and finally they switched him to Dilantin, which brought him some relief and let him sleep. He was blacking out on and off all day and even had hallucinations while my sister was there–he was describing seeing green circles swirling in front of him and creatures crawling on him, etc. Freaked her out.
But this morning my sister called him and though he wasn’t able to quite explain it to her, she was able to speak to his mom (who, coincidentally, is also at the same hospital still recovering from her hip surgery–that’s why Matthew was at her place the other night), whose physical therapist was able to explain this Rhabdo thing to her.
Looking at the usual causes, it might be his over-exercising with not enough hydration (Matthew is on his bike all day throughout the city and the heat, and has been doing a lot of gym work lately). None of the other factors seem likely (no drugs or alcohol, no crush injury as far as I’ve heard), although possibly the hereditary factor could play into it.
Anyway they’re going to be flushing him with fluids and possibly dialysis as well, depending on how he’s doing.
Yipe so in my family we now have two cases where exercising turns out to be life-threatening. (My father was jogging when he fell and injured his spinal cord, and died a week later. Of course he was 80 at the time, but still.)
I’m just joking, morbidly; I know exercising is not really a killer! But damn. I feel so sorry for Matthew, he’s still in a lot of pain and it doesn’t sound as if they’re doing much pain control yet with him. Hopefully he’ll be able to sleep at least. I know my sister is feeling a little better at least knowing what’s wrong, and that he’s being treated.
Anyway. Thank you all very very much for the support and ideas. I’d take back the imaginary prizes for those who guessed kidney stones, but even the doctors last night were assuming that’s what it was, so clearly the symptoms were very close! Yeesh.
Thanks USCDiver and eclectic wench. Unfortunately something else seems to be going on. Although his kidney function is improving, Matthew’s pain is still extreme–and he is no exaggerator of pain. It’s along his sciatic nerve apparently. The doctor (only seen once a day) says it might be a herniated disc after all. But the hospital is taking its sweet-ass time to do a CT or MRI of the area.
I don’t get it, even if this was Rhabdo, it’s often caused by a compartment or compression injury, so after 24 hours wouldn’t they figure out that there might be some actual injury going on?
I’m looking around on my own and I’m seeing something called cauda equina syndrome, which sounds awfully similar to Matthew’s issues–sudden pain, numbness, loss of kidney function. It can be caused by a herniated disc apparently. Of course it can also because by tumors, so that’s great and naturally what I’m most worried about.
And of course the hospital is very busy, plus this is a holiday weekend… so things are glacial in reacting to help his pain. Yesterday they were giving him Neurontin. Today he was in hysterics, the pain was so bad, and they gave him Ativan/Dilaudid (sorry for messing that up before, thanks for the correction, USCDiver!). But it is taking my poor sister ages to get the nurses to shift into action and contact a doctor to decide that he needs an MRI. They apparently will do one, but she has no idea when. They haven’t done a single x-ray, ct or MRI since Wednesday, and that was just of his kidney.
Naturally I know every patient (or patient’s loved one!) thinks his issues should be dealt with ASAP. And I also know that’s not possible. They have to treat those who are in dire/immediately life-threatening needs first. (I guess it’s good that they don’t seem to think Matthew’s in that situation.) Still it’s so very frustrating and scary. I’m aching for my sister, who’s been there almost constantly since it happened.
Does Matthew also take statins for high cholesterol? Those can cause rhabdomyolosis, and I personally believe that a lot of people who think they have fibromyalgia actually have this, in a low-level chronic form.
And I’m guessing he was on Dilaudid, not Dilantin.
Cauda equina syndrome doesn’t affect kidney function, it causes loss of *bladder *function due to compression of the nerves that control your ability to poop and pee.
Yes, you’re right. USCDiver also corrected me. I have no idea why Dilantin sounded right–or why it’s more familiar to me than Dilaudid.