Lyle Gentry

Lyle came home from work on Friday with a headache that started while cleaning out a grain bin that had moldy corn in it.  His headache progressively got worse through the night into Saturday morning and he started running fever and just not feeling well overall.  We went to St. Anthony Memorial Hospital E.R. and he was admitted with possible pneumonia, the chest x-ray was clear at that time but the Dr felt like it may not show on x-ray until the next day.  He was started on antibiotics to treat pnemonia along with pain meds because he described his headache as 'explosive', the worst headache he has ever had.  He was tested for influenza and it was negative.  On Sunday, a ct scan of his chest confirmed that he had pnemonia so the same treatment he had been getting plus another antibiotic was added.  The pain meds would lessen his headache some but it would never go away completely & he couldn't tolerate the light even being on.  Sunday evening, he had problems breathing and almost quit breathing so they moved him to ICU.  They got him stable over night & he then had another breathing episode early Monday morning so they wanted to fly him to St. Johns in Spfld.  The helicopters could not fly due to weather conditions so he went by ambulance.  He was intubated and had a central line put in before leaving Effingham.  Once he got to Spfld, the infectious disease Dr was on top of things right away, testing him for many things, including several viruses.  One of the viruses, the corona virus, was positive.  This virus may have triggered the pnemonia along with being in the grain bin.  It has now developed into ARDS, acute respiratory distress syndrome, a very serious, sometimes fatal disease.  Lyle is on a respirator, heavily sedated and medically paralyzed to give his body time to rest and let the machines do the work to heal him.  We know this will be a long process where things may look better and then look worse before they look better again.  We appreciate your prayers SO much because we know that God is our ultimate healer & we haven't lost our faith!!