83-year-old man's experience of "Yang Kang": once life-threatening, turned negative to find pneumonia

Read Time:10 Minute, 56 Second

The 83-year-old Zhang Quanfu has always been in good health, almost no medication in his life, a little discomfort to carry a carry on the past. But a vomit after contracting the new coronavirus made him feel his life was threatened – because the vomit almost choked into his trachea.

In the afternoon of Dec. 19, 2022, Zhang Quanfu’s head felt heavy, and he felt short of breath before going to bed at night, and when he woke up to go to the bathroom the next day, he felt light-headed and unsteady. His partner, who was also light-headed, walked around and fell onto the bed.

For their only daughter, Zhang Min, the past 20 days have been difficult. Both parents had a number of underlying illnesses, and the combination of the new coronavirus infection made her very anxious. She was infected early and feared that cross-contamination would aggravate her parents’ condition, so she did not dare to come and look after them until she turned negative herself.

The recovery process for the two elderly also had its share of thrills. Their antigen test had turned negative on December 30, but Zhang Min saw that their diet and mental state were not good, so she went to the hospital for a checkup and found that both elderly had varying degrees of infection in their lungs. Fortunately, the medical treatment was timely and they are now recovering well in terms of diet and mental state.

Zhang Quanfu feels that his sequelae is “drowsiness”, every morning after eating, sitting and looking at the phone for a while, sleepy eyes, then go to bed. The same in the afternoon, feel sleepy, sleep until four or five o’clock. Until January 12, the day before the interview with the public network – poster news, he felt much better spirit, but walking faster, but also some wheezing.

Zhang Min feels lucky to have taken her parents to the hospital in time and not delayed her condition. She said that if she shares her experience, it is to make sure to pay more attention to the elderly’s diet status as well as their mental state, and find abnormalities to seek medical attention. It’s important to eat more, drink more, rest more, and give your parents more meat, eggs and milk to replenish their protein. Also, keep an oximeter on hand so that blood oxygen saturation can be tested at any time.

“Since winter itself is the season of high incidence of respiratory diseases and exacerbation of cardiovascular diseases in the elderly, which recently overlapped with the new coronavirus infection, there are more deaths among the elderly, which prompts us to pay more attention to elderly patients and do our best to save their lives.” Jiao Yahui, director general of the medical department of the National Health and Wellness Commission, said at a press conference on the State Council’s joint prevention and control mechanism held on Jan. 14, 2023.

The data disclosed at that conference showed that from December 8, 2022 to January 12, 2023, a total of 59,938 deaths related to new coronavirus infections occurred in medical institutions nationwide, with an average age of 80.3 years for the deaths, about 90.1 percent aged 65 and above, and more than 90 percent of the deaths were combined with underlying diseases.

The following is Zhang Min’s account of his parents’ experience with Yang Kang.

I was infected on December 18, 2022. The reason why I remember so clearly is that the unit organized a single nucleic acid test for a single person on the 16th, and I was negative. I felt I was safe, so I bought a lot of medicine for the elderly to send home on the 17th, including fever reducers, cough medicine, etc., and an N95 mask. I want to send this one time after that, then try to reduce contact with the elderly to prevent them from getting the new coronavirus. My dad is 83 and my mom is 75, and both have underlying medical conditions. My dad has a bad heart with incomplete heart leaflet closure, degenerative heart valve disease and old heart attacks, and my mom has diabetes, Alzheimer’s, hypothyroidism and high triglycerides.

On December 17, 2022, Zhang Min bought some of the medicine for my parents

However, in the afternoon of the 18th, I felt weak and some chills in my back, and took my temperature 37.4°C, and my fever reached 39.2°C in the evening. It just so happens that I still have antigen at home, and once I tested it, two very thick red lines showed up, and it was indeed positive. I then called my parents to remind them to pay attention to it as well.

The result was that on the 19th my father felt the sensation, his head was heavy and he had a fever, thirty-seven or eight degrees, not particularly high. My mother also had symptoms at about the same time.

But they didn’t tell me at first, my fever was quite high and they were worried about me. I didn’t tell them until the 21st when I was feeling better and called them.

During those days, my daughter became the main force, making meals from our house and delivering them to the elderly. Sometimes order take-out and bring it to the door.

On December 24, I turned cloudy and wanted to go out for a walk, feeling out of breath. It was on the 25th that I came over to see the elderly and tested them with antigen, which was still weakly positive. They were in okay shape, neither had a serious fever, my dad only took two ibuprofen before and after, my mom didn’t. They didn’t take much medication, except ibuprofen to reduce fever, anti-inflammatory cough capsules and cough syrup, and both of them turned negative on December 30.

However, in the following days I observed that they were not in good condition, they hardly coughed, but when they coughed, I could hear that they coughed very deeply. And they were depressed and just wanted to sleep. The house was clean before, but it was particularly dirty for a few days, and they didn’t have the energy to manage it. My mom kept saying she was nauseous and couldn’t eat. I came over to make fish soup, and they drank it for two days before finishing it.

I reminded them to eat the food as “medicine”, eat the food, the immune system will improve, the recovery process can be shortened. We brought milk and eggs, and my daughter came over to give them beef and chicken soup.

I am glad that last Spring I bought an oxygen machine for the elderly and gave them an oximeter. I used the oximeter to measure both of them, but the oxygen level was unstable, sometimes up to 95 or 96, sometimes as low as 88 or 93. 93 is the critical value of oxygen saturation, and I was afraid when I saw how low it was, worrying about viral myocarditis.

Oximeter in Zhang Quanfu’s home

I took them to the hospital on December 31 for a lung CT, a cardiac enzyme profile and a blood gas test. The good thing is that there is no other problem except lung infection. My dad had multiple lamellar shadows in both lungs and my mom had multiple scattered ground glass shadows in both lungs.

The new coronavirus infection was certainly not a large cold, and the fact that they turned negative and then developed pneumonia really scared me. And both of them showed opposite results from the tests, my dad’s symptoms including gastrointestinal reactions looked worse, my mom mainly couldn’t eat, but the tests revealed that my mom’s lung infection was worse.

I asked the doctor if I needed a hangnail, and he said it was viral and there was little point in giving a hangnail, and there were quite a lot of sick people in the hospital at the time, and I was worried about cross-infection in the hospital, so I gave both of them herbal soup for 5 days each.

On the night of January 2, 2023, my dad vomited a lot and called me, saying that he felt his life was in danger and that the vomit almost choked his trachea. I was worried about his electrolyte disorder, so I quickly brought the electrolyte effervescent tablets I had prepared in advance and gave them to him. I said that he should not take any medicine now and go to the hospital again.

On January 3, I took them to the hospital again for a checkup, and did blood analysis, cardiac enzymes, and kidney and liver functions, which were all found to be normal. My father used mainly cough suppressant, digestive and anti-viral drugs, while my mother used mainly anti-inflammatory, gastrointestinal and cough suppressant drugs.

Each time the bottle took almost a whole day, I also hesitated to go straight to the hospital. On the one hand, the beds were tight, and I was afraid of cross-contamination in the hospital, but most of all, my mom has Alzheimer’s disease, so I had to keep an eye on her and keep repeating the situation to her, and I was afraid that she might get lost at night walking around in an unfamiliar environment. So it was finally decided to go to the bottle during the day and go home at night, where they can still rest better in a familiar environment, which is good for recovery.

I work in hospital administration, so I took them to our hospital for the injection, mainly because my daughter was with me, and I could go over to check on them whenever I wanted, and I could also take care of my work at hand. My mom had a total of 4 days of injections and my dad had 3 days. Both of them are recovering well now, no coughing and no gastrointestinal reactions, I plan to bring them to the hospital for a review in a few days.

Zhang Quanfu and his wife

I think we are very lucky that I turned negative quickly and my parents’ condition was not delayed. If I were to share my experience, it would be to make sure to pay more attention to the elderly’s dietary status as well as their mental status. If they are depressed, they must seek medical attention as soon as possible. It is important to eat more, drink more, rest more, and give them more meat, eggs, and milk to replenish protein. My father is “strong” and can eat more, so he recovered faster than my mother, and of course he has fewer underlying illnesses than my mother. It is also crucial to have an oximeter so that they can check their oxygen saturation at all times. In addition, it is best to go to the hospital to check the heart and lungs after the elderly have turned negative to rule out risks.

I think it’s important to have the right amount of medication at home, and I didn’t use a lot of the medication I had. I also asked myself if the medication I had prepared was not the right one, like the cough syrup that they relied on to relieve a difficult throat, but I ended up going to the hospital. I work in a hospital and have accumulated a certain amount of general medical knowledge, and I can ask my colleagues for advice, but for families who do not have this condition, it is crucial to seek timely medical attention and receive regular treatment.

The elderly must be given high priority. My aunt in Shanghai, who is 89 years old, turned negative only two or three days after her infection. A week ago, my aunt called my dad and she continued to repeat a few words for over 20 minutes, “I am now” “I am now” …… straight away she didn’t know what she was saying. Later contacted my cousin, who at first thought my aunt’s after-effects were brain fog and transient memory loss. Blood oxygen was measured at home at 88, and when I went to the hospital, there was 1/3 infection in the lungs, and a brain attack was also found. I also consulted our hospital doctor to learn that the new coronavirus not only attacks the respiratory system, but also the heart and nervous system. The symptoms of the elderly may not appear to be serious, but this may not be the real situation.

To be honest, it was a very anxious time, I was worried every night if the old man would be okay, and I was even afraid to receive a phone call from them at night.

It’s hard, I have no siblings, the child’s grandparents also Yang, my object to take care of the grandparents side, so this side mainly rely on me and my daughter. This process is painful, weight loss of six or seven pounds, but finally came over.