The Great old man sick

Wife's Grandpa was sick and came down from Myanmar to see a doctor. Apparently, Myanmar hospital's reputation was not very good. There is often no electricity and sanitation is at the most basic level.

My wife and her family thinks its a common cold or flu. I saw him and pulled my wife aside and told her frankly that I feel something is not right. I am a bit experience in this matter as my own father had passed away with kidney cancer. I have this gut feeling that he might have contracted cancer too.

We took him to the local town hospital in Maesai. The doctor said he had severe infection in his stomach due to an operation 3 years ago for his gallbladder stone.. Alamak.. want to smoke people also dunno how to smoke properly. He's clueless!! His suggestion was to transfer him to the former hospital who operated him. (Taichi 108 style liao) . We obliged happily anyway as he won't be able to help him much anyway.

We took off in an ambulance to a bigger hospital in Chiang Rai. Wife and baby did not go. Only wife's brother and I accompanied Grandpa. At the hospital, he was immediately admitted to ICU (Intensive Care Unit). His blood pressure was only 80/40. The doctor (who speaks quite good English) informed me that as Grandpa has mild diabetes, he needs to be monitored carefully.

After diagnosis with X-rays and blood test. Bad news. It seems that grandpa does have a severe infection in his old operation wound. But the cause is unknown. His condition is worsen as the infection has spread to his kidneys and bladder. The case was more complicated as his kidney is now failing due to his diabetes. Good news is that all this can be controlled but there is one thing in the blood test the doctor said is very bad news. His white blood cells count is way up high. 7 times the normal. He mentioned it might be due to sceptic shock which makes the body produce more WBC. So next day, after Grandpa stabilised, another blood test was taken and again, 7 times the normal.

The doctor informed me that this is a symptom of Leukemia and asked whether I want to give him a thorough check (extracting his bone marrow). I discussed with my wife and decided to say no. Extraction is painful (a big needle is inserted into the lower spine or hip) and I already checked with the doctor. Even if the diagnosis is correct, they aren't able to do much as Grandpa is already 78 and he has diabetes.

So 2 days in ICU, grandpa is feeling better. We told only her sis and her younger brother about the possibility of cancer and we wept a bit. I could only advise them to spend more time with him.

We booked a personal car to ferry them back to Keng Tung. Wife and baby is going to tag along and spend a few days there. Not a very good month indeed. Puppy died and Grandpa sick.....