Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Bookworm #5

Since he was born, #5 has breathed faster than he should. And no one really thought much of it. His respiratory rate was the upper level of what is considered normal. So, the pediatrician ordered some labs and a chest x-ray just to see if there was a problem. The labs were fine, and the chest films were inconclusive. So he ordered an echo, but we miscommunicated about who was calling who about what. So, the echo didn't happen until this afternoon.


The echo was at 3:30pm, and it showed fluid around his heart. Our favorite pediatric cardiologist was on-call, and he came in immediately. He admitted #5 to PICU at St. Francis in order to drain the fluid in a simple procedure.


But, it wasn’t simple. In the process, his heart started bleeding, and he wound up having heart surgery in the PICU room. Now he is stabilizing in the PICU on many, many drugs. And it’s going to be a long night.


In the process of all this, we learned that his heart looks just like Bookworm #1's. So we will be starting the process of genetic diagnosis. It is possible that he has defied our good odds of having only healthy children after Bookworm #1. He may have COX-2 deficiency.


We'll just have to wait and see. Please pray.

3 comments:

Ro said...

Praying with all my heart!! Very upset that I can't be there but I'm praying with every strength of my being!

Valerie said...

Oh, Christa! You are in my prayers for sure. Please let me know if there is anything you need at all.

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