Is it ok for me to call skilled nursing facility every 5.5 hrs to give my mom pain meds for amputation 7 days ago? Crying in pain 2X today.

The pain meds probably don’t work while on dialysis because the medication gets dialyzed out of the body by the hemodialysis process.
Ask her providers if they can prescribe a pain med in the form of a patch. A dialysis center won’t give IM pain medication shots.
Be aware however that getting pain medication these days is like pulling teeth. Usually the patch is prescribed for terminal patients so her chances may be slim for this as the side effects for her (somnolence, constipation, dizziness).
I would medicate her right after dialysis (if by mouth) so it stays in the body to help.
Be prepared because her doctors will be weaning down the pain medication soon.
God forbid a patient should be in pain and need, not abuse, narcotics for real pain relief. This opioid crisis royally pi*^es me off when I see folks ordered Tylenol for some painful or uncomfortable procedure.

I am so sorry for the pain that your mom experienced after her amputation. I hear it’s pretty awful.

The pain after losing a limb is horrendous. When I was young I was involved with a guy who lost a limb after a horrible motorcycle accident. He became addicted to morphine while in the hospital due to the pain being so severe. He was able to overcome his addiction.

I did not meet him until years after his accident so I did not see him suffer, nor see him as an active addict. He was in recovery when I met him. He told me about the accident. It was at night. He wasn’t drinking or speeding. There was a knocked down utility pole in the street that he couldn’t see. He hit it and flew off his bike. Gangrene set in at the hospital and he lost his arm.

I know with my own accident and I didn’t even lose an arm like my old boyfriend, I had surgery with rods placed on my bones. I had an open compound fracture. The pain was so great that the morphine drip in the hospital barely took the edge off.

With my history of growing up with a heroin addicted brother I pretty much suffered on my own once I left the hospital because I am extremely reluctant to using even a moderate amount of opioids.

I was bothered by the muscle spasms that hit me out of the blue just as much as I was bothered by the pain. Again, I took very few of the muscle relaxers. I take the minimum amount of meds that I need.

I hope your mom will recover as quickly and as best as she can. I certainly feel for her and for you. Keep us posted on her progress and let us know how you are doing. We are here to offer our support. Take care. 💗

No person who has had an amputation should be in pain at all. I would ask how you would go about getting her pain management. Find out what Dr. is in charge of her care and call him. The Nurses should be giving her meds on time. If the meds are not working, the doctor should be upping the dose.

No advice, I just want to say how sorry I am for you & your mom. It absolutely breaks my heart when my mom cries. I know it's especially hard when you can't check on her in person.

No, don't do that. The nurses have many patients to care for. They have a schedule they try to keep for dispensing meds. Your calls will only delay mom's meds and frustrate the nurses. You want a good relationship with them. Call the doc to ask about increasing frequency and or dosage or maybe try a different med. I am allergic to codeine and all the synthetic derivatives so they do not work at all for me, just causes rashes.

Don't keep calling repeatedly, the phone lines are so jammed with calls that staff can't get their regular work done, not to mention they are all scrambling to deal with extra precautions just to get in to work😓
Your profile doesn't mention dementia, can she not ask for herself? In any case if the meds are not prescribed that often they can't be given, and her renal failure only complicated things. This is something that you need to hammer out with her doctors and her renal team, who can then hopefully direct the NH.

This is a horrible thing to be happening, and as you say the timing couldn't be worse.

I understand how strong the urge must be to do *something* to help your mother. But just remember - every time you pick up the phone, somebody has to answer it. If you speak for only ten seconds, they've still got to pick up the phone, note the contact, note what you said, go back to what they were doing before...

Or, if they don't answer, you're going to go spare with worrying.

With no visitors going in, all of the voluntary work and support that usually comes from them (extra snacks, changing drinking water, plumping pillows, laundry etc etc etc) will either be done by the staff or not done at all; and you can predict that at least some staff will be forced to go off work in the next few weeks. It's going to be extremely hard going.

You might be able to get better information about what pain relief was prescribed for her from her surgical team. Have you tried giving them a call?

"No doctors over the weekend"? At a post-op Skilled Nursing Facility??? Crikey.

Grit your teeth and hold on. It is horrible, absolutely horrible, to think of your poor mother being left in pain, but the pain relief will be attended to and will take effect - just not as fast as I'm sure we would all want to happen.

I don’t know the answer but I wanted to say how very sorry I am. There are nurses who participate in this forum so stick around for help.

Best wishes to you and your mom.