Time line to date

Ok so here is the time line

3/16/13 - Father and Mother were on a tour of a volcano and father started having symptoms of a stroke with aphasia and coordination problems. He was life flighted to the hospital in San Jose Costa Rica.  Mother was in contact with Shum but their cell phones don't work in Costa Rica.

3/17/13 - Father is better this morning -- email from shum attached
Hey all 

so a few things

Dad is doing fine this am. he is speaking clearly and seems back to baseline. so this is likely a tia, or transient ischemic attack.  aka mini-stroke. i have spoken to him, and he is in good spirits.  I asked if the flight was fun in the helicopter, and he said 'well, for one of us.'  last night he could not speak much, and was having trouble w/ his right hand. I am not sure he is at baseline but he seems to be.

mother was concerned that there was a problem with their insurance, but after 3 hours on the phone I have been able to verify that they are covered. this is good news. they had been told they might not be, which was prompting talk of flying them home for part of the evaluation to safe them a huge bill, but those questions are moot, I believe.  there is a coordinator for this who is calling them now, and there is a process to get them home that may be initiated.

They are doing, I think, the right work up for him in that hospital, it is just much slower than it would be here. but I am less concerned about this now that his neurologic sx are better.

today, he will be getting ct scan of the head and some other tests.

the phone number for the hospital is 011 506 252 1000

ask for room 406 (cuarto cuatro cero seis)

moms will pick up.  the line will be used for insurance calls and other things so perhaps limited phone calls would be judicial.


all in all, things are going better than they were in the wee hours this am.

shum