We heard back from Dr Lobatz and after having reviewed the results of Matt’s EEG and MRI the doctor is suggesting that we have Matt in another Telemetry Monitoring EEG Study.  It sounds like because of Matt having such a normal EEG in a videoed 20 minute session, Dr Lobatz would like to conduct a longer more extensive study to see how Matt’s activities change throughout the coarse of a few days.  This involves Matt being admitted to a hospital for 3 days and nights.  I was told by the doctors office that Matt was referred to Tri City Medical Center for the study.  We were also told that Tri City and UCSD were the 2 hospitals in the County of San Diego that do these kinds of studies.  All of this sounds expensive so now when we get the referral we will have to go back to Kaiser to get their approval.  If that doesn’t happen first time around we have to once again appeal with the State of California and the Insurance Commissioners Office to get all that approved so that Kaiser can cover the cost.  That process could take weeks or even months so I will keep you posted when we are thru that.  Besides that, Spencer is in China this month to teach so we were fortunate enough to schedule one of his colleges, Jon Kern from Scripps Encinitas Rehab who also works with Dr Lobatz and Spencer’s mentor Waleed who is also in China this month. 

We had a nice Christmas Eve.  We went to Spirit of Joy Lutheran Church in Ramona for Christmas Eve Service.  Everyone at Spirit of Joy was very accommodating and were very happy to see Matt back at for the first time since his accident.  Matthew received alot of attention and warm welcomes.  He did very well and as he settled in he looked around and listened to the Sermon and Song throughout the service.  After we came home, the Smith family came over to visit, share blessings and exchange gifts.  It was a very nice evening, one like we haven’t had in a couple of years.  You all stay safe and have a Happy New Year! 

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Matt has developed many activities now and we now have a list of about 20 activities he does daily.  With all that, we have to rotate that list daily so Matt doesn’t miss any skills he’s developed.  With a more structured list of activities we have started combining multiple tasks as a challenge and that is complicating Matt’s focus and he does well with that.  We are still waiting to hear back from Dr. Lobats as well as still working thru Matt’s coumadin management with Kaiser.  It’s all a process that has to be worked thru the system and that all takes time, we’ll get there.  Lisa and I are now setting up a series of speech therapies thru someone that Spencer has been in contact with.  She is someone that knows of Matt and is very interested in treating him.  It will start with an evaluation probably out in Sorento Valley.  Sounds like that’s where his sessions would be but Lisa, Spencer and I all feel she is the right person that can get us on a program that we can work at home to develop memory, attention processing, executive function and other cognitive and linguistic processes.  Along with this the speech department at SDSU has also contacted us to get Matt back into their speech program as well so we are pursuing that for the spring/summer sessions.  With all that Matt and Lisa are going to be very busy after the first of the year.  My leg is healing very well and hopefully my next visit to the sports doctor I will be released from his care and able to go back to work sometime in January as well.  When that happens, I won’t be as available to help with getting Matt to the places he needs to go so if anyone can help Lisa once in a while that would be great.  Please don’t hesitate to contact us if that is in anyway possible or even if someone could be around for an hour or two now and then just to give Lisa a break.  She does an amazing job with Matt and he wouldn’t be doing as well as he is without Lisa, Lindsey and Lisa’s mom Joan.  Lindsey’s not as available now that she finished school and is well into her career at the dental office.   Joan as most of you know, also spends much of her time down the hill working 5 to 7 days a week.  Hope you all have a wonderful Holiday,  God Bless.

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