So I went to the emergency room at MSK where, upon being seen, the interventional radiologist on call drew lines with a Sharpie around the area of reddened skin so that changes could be noted in the morning. I went home, where I was greeted with the message that I had to call the emergency room immediately, which I of course did. The emergency room nurse who had performed my triage informed me that my blood pressure was 220 over 90 and that I had to come back to be evaluated by another doctor. As I have had "perfect" to "borderline low" blood pressure all of my life, I was somewhat incredulous; but realizing that I now have to be open-minded to any possibility, I reported back to the emergency room, where I was seen instantly. The nurse rechecked my blood pressure and got a similarly high reading. Both times, the nurse had taken the reading from a cuff around my leg, as I have a PICC in my left arm and phlebitis in my right arm from the prior installation and removal of a PICC. Faced with the prospect of having to be treated for high blood pressure on top of everything else, it occurred to me to request that, phlebitis or no phlebitis, the nurse take my blood pressure from a cuff around my right arm. That blood pressure reading was 135 0ver 79-- high for me historically, perhaps because of the stress of the day's intervention and events, but no cause for alarm. (This morning, when I went for chemotherapy, my blood pressure was down to 107 over 69.) After a short wait, I was seen by a physician and discharged.
As you might expect, I remained quite apprehensive about the progression of the redness around the site of the Mediport. I slept fitfully, then reexamined the site around 1:30 this morning. The redness was receding! I went to the kitchen, raided the refrigerator, and went back to bed.
