Saysbadman

Thanks for the post! It was an interesting read. It's always cool learn about something new especially with a good out come. My family has a rare genetic abnormality called hht that also goes un diagnosed. Good luck in your journeys!

You have a 50/50 shot at inheriting. I don't have it, but my nephew, sister, father, grandmother, and great grandfather had it. There are two kinds one causes avm's on the liver and lungs, and the other causes them on the brain and intestine. We did know until my sister was pregnant that our family had it, but pregnancy puts a strain on your entire body. My sister ended up in the hospital with an o2 saturation in the high 70s, and nobody knew why. A pulmanalogist incorrectly diagnosed her with pneumonia, and they kept her on oxygen. She just wasn't getting so she ended up having to go to the mayo clinic where the diagnosed her with hht. She had a lot of avm's in her lungs, but only three major ones. They had to go through the artery in her leg and used a coil to constrict the three in her lungs. She has to be check periodically if her oxygen drops again. She is doing great now though! http://youtu.be/RA1uu2D0l7w

What is your job title? I worked at a state institution for 11 years as a psychiatric technician. We had a acute side and a subacute side. I worked in the acute side, but would be pulled to subacute when the staff was short. My experience was the acute care side was harder as the patients were higher functioning, and weren't use to the structured environment. Subacute folks were there longer, and built a rapport. If they ever needed to be redirected more often/ were more unruly then they would shift them back to acute care until they leveled off again. Also subacute never got admissions. So all their patients came through us first. It was a sometimes dangerous job, but could be rewarding. I think I had more patience for the more severe illness cases than the folks that were more normal. Have you ran into many patients outside of work? Because of hippa we weren't really supposed to act like we knew them.