8/23/06 Wednesday (31) Day 1 of Rehab

            And so it begins – the start of your next trek in this journey to recovery.  You have a full day of assessment to be done, occupational therapy for your upper body, physical therapy for your lower body, and speech therapy for your mind.

            When I finally got to your room for the day it was approximately 2:30p.  You had already had your abdominal wound dressing changed, the wound vac dressing on you heel changed, occupational therapy twice, physical therapy and speech therapy once.  You were sitting in a wheelchair when I walked in the room.

            While I was there speech therapy returned and asked you a lot of questions and had you demonstrate your ability to understand direction and understand comprehension of sentences.  You did a great job!  The therapist also tested your short term memory and recall.

            Physical therapy came back as well and had you wheel yourself in the wheelchair around the nurse station – again you did quite well.  Once back in the room she brought you to the bedside, had you raise yourself out of the wheelchair (not putting any weight on your left foot), pivot on your right let and have you sit on the side of the bed.  Fantastic!  Once on the bed, sitting on the side, she had you do some resistance exercises with both legs – then while lying in bed did some passive exercises.

            We found out that you are assigned a team of therapists who will follow you through out your whole stay at Stallworth.  This is great for consistency and continuity.  I would rate your first day a success.  Marvelous!