Doug's Sounding Board

I started at the anti-coagulation clinic yesterday so I’m not going to have to get a blood draw every few days to check my clotting levels, not I can have a finger-prick test and a little device tells me in 30 seconds. No more waiting at the blood draw center! Also with that I have to not take the multi-vitamin or the calcium supplement I was taking because they both contain a lot of vitamin K. I have to only have very small quantities of green leafy vegetables and broccoli and a few other foods. Other vegetables I can eat but still in less quantity than I was consuming before all this started (about 2 pounds a day).

The doctor said that when I started at the Coumadin clinic I could be more active and even though my levels don’t seem to be stabilized yet both the clinic and the doctor said it was good to be active as long as I wasn’t in danger of falling or bumping into things. So no scooter or bike riding for a few months, but exercise and running are fine. Any activity is fine as long as I avoid cuts and bruises. So with that yesterday I returned to the office, yay! I was glad to be able to discuss problems directly with co-workers instead of just in e-mail or IM. I’m keeping my leg elevated and straight when I feel like it even though the doctor said it wasn’t necessary. It just feels good to empty my leg after I’ve been up and about for awhile.

So what next? Now I keep getting my levels adjusted and around the end of March I’ll have another ultrasound to see if the clot is gone. If it isn’t then I’ll find out what the next step is then. If it is then I might be on Coumadin a little while longer until they are sure nothing is recurring. If it turns out I’m a hyper-clotter then I’ll probably be on some form of blood thinner from here on out.