LAST DAY

I had my last full day today. Fortunately the outpatient clinic was busier and we actually had 3 patients this morning. The first patient was not receptive at all, but the second two were a joy to work with. One was an elderly gentleman who wanted to lose weight and supposedly had HTN and dyslipidemia, though medications seemed to be controlling both conditions fairly well. The second gentleman was very young and he came in with his wife. He had surprisingly high blood pressure for his age. They came one right after the other and the most striking thing was how differently they carried their weight. The younger gentleman had a BMI of about 35 and the older gentleman had a BMI of about 36. However, the older gentleman appeared obese and carried a significant amount of the weight in his abdomen, whereas the younger gentleman looked overweight, but not obese at all. This was a good reminder that BMI can be deceptive.

I forgot to mention that last week one of the dietitians called to tell me that one of the patients I had reassessed had been taken off her tube feeding. Apparently she had refused to eat a while back, and so was put on tube feeding. The patient has severe dementia, so when I did my evaluation I spoke with a nurse to get information about her. In the conversation the nurse mentioned that this woman would eat little bits of food that were occasionally offered to her, and so I asked the dietitian to put in a consult to have the patient evaluated by the SLP. Apparently the results indicated that she was safe to eat and she no longer is being tube fed. I was very pleased to hear the news.