It's Wednesday, and time for chemo again. Every dose of chemo has to go in a fresh IV and she's running out of places to poke. So, she is going to get a PICC line today which is a catheter inserted into a vein by her bicep and runs through the vein, across her chest and stops between her 4th and 5th rib (close to the heart, but not too close). The nurses will hook up IVs and take blood from the PICC line. No more poking! Chemo can be administered through it, too. And the catheter is like a watering hose - it has little holes along it for the medicine to slowly leak out instead of all at the end.
CJ, the nurse inserting the PICC line, was great. She had to sterilize the area and then insert the catheter. Mom was very nervous. CJ was very personable and shared some stories from her previous job as a gastrointestinal nurse. "It's amazing what people get stuck up there!" Her stories kept Mom's mind off the procedure, and she was done in no time.
To make sure the catheter was in the right place, CJ took a chest x-ray. Mom just had to stay laying in bed and they brought in the portable X-ray machine. First, it was in too far, so she backed it out. She took another X-ray. It was still in too far, so she backed it out a little more and took another X-ray. That one was perfect- just where it needs to be. When CJ looked at the X-ray she said "Well my heavens, she's got on an underwire!"
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