Whirlwind!

After waiting in the ER yesterday for almost eight hours, we were finally admitted to a room around midnight last night. The doctors have done labwork, RSV testing, chest x-rays and an echocardiogram. The bloodwork came back fine and the RSV was negative. The x-ray, however, showed some patchy areas on Rebekah's right lung. This could be due to some cardiac issues (her cardiologist feels that is unlikely), but most probably is indicative of viral pneumonia. We did have the echo done this morning just to rule out any cardiac possibilities, but have not seen the cardiologist to get the results of that test.

For now, Rebekah is resting comfortably on a liter of oxygen. Her sats are holding steady in the mid-80's, which is a huge improvement from the low-to mid-70's we were seeing in the ER last night. She is continuing to receive breathing treatments every 4 hours and oral steroids twice a day.

If this is, in fact, viral pneumonia, there is not much we can do except provide supportive care (oxygen, breathing treatments, steroids) and wait for Rebekah's body to fight it off. With her compromised immune system already overloaded with her last respiratory illness, it may take a while for her to recover from this. Not only is Rebekah more susceptible to catching respiratory illnesses, it takes her much longer to get over them than it would for a child with a normal immune system and no other heart or lung issues. We are patiently waiting this one out and trying to get all of the help for Rebekah that she needs.

Once again, thank you for all of your prayers, phone calls, emails, facebook and blog comments. It encourages us so much to be reminded of how special Rebekah is to so many people.

Nancy