Thursday P.M. Edition

What an up-and-down day! Rebekah was doing well this morning and early afternoon, but by this evening she started running a low-grade temperature and having more trouble keeping her sats in the low 80's.

Rebekah's cardiologist reviewed the results of the echo that was done this morning, and, as suspected, there are no cardiac issues in play right now. Everything that is going on appears to be solely respiratory. That is very good news! At least we are only dealing with one issue, not multiples!

We finally met Dr. Gwinn, the pulmonologist today. I say finally because there has been talk of having a consultation with her since our last hospital visit, and in fact, we had an appointment already scheduled with her on March 1. I had just filled out and returned the new patient information the day before we came into the hospital! Anyway, Dr. Gwinn read the x-rays taken last night and she saw patches of fluid in both the right and left lungs. The fluid could either be pneumonia, or excess build-up of fluid due to her heart and lungs working so hard to fight off this illness. Dr. Gwinn felt it warranted increasing Rebekah's dose of Lasix for tonight only to try to get some of that fluid off her lungs. If that does not seem to do the trick, we will do some more testing (blood work) to check for viral or bacterial infections. We did have some blood work done last night in the ER, but it clotted before any testing could be done on it. After four attempts to get an IV placed and two blood draws that clotted, the ER doctor decided to stop trying to get the blood and let the attending doctor order it if necessary. We will see tomorrow if Dr. Gwinn feels it is necessary.

I must say that I was very impressed with Dr. Gwinn. She is the only pediatric pulmonologist in Greenville, and she is very thorough. She had done her homework and came into the room with two pages of notes written about Rebekah and her different medical issues. She seemed to be very in tune with what was going on with Rebekah's particular respiratory issues, so I am hopeful that she will have some good suggestions for long-term management. Maybe with her help we will be able to stay out of the hospital for longer than three weeks at a time! :)

Rebekah is now sleeping soundly. Tonight she will be having her breathing treatments and continuous feeds as usual. Because of her low-grade temp (the highest so far was 99.9F), she will have her temperature checked every two hours through the night, or until they have two consecutive normal temperatures. Right now she is on about 3/4 liter of oxygen and her sats have been stable in the low- to mid-80's. We're heading for bed and hoping for a good, uneventful night!

Nancy