Eli's oxygen saturations have been fluctuating and trending around 70%. His x-ray this morning showed his upper lobe of his lungs has collapsed again. They have been having him lay on different sides to see if that helps. They also used a tool to apply small vibrations to this part of his chest to see if that would help "pop" the upper lobe. They also increased his oxygen to see if this would help too. In a little bit he will have another x-ray to check to see if the lung is still collapsed. The reason his lung is collapsing is due to the pulmonary hypertension. As far as the pulmonary hypertension goes, they are still practicing "minimal stimulation" to help him relax his body. He is still on sedation and regular pain meds. He is also still on the nitric gas.
Eli's Arterial Switch Operation is scheduled for tomorrow morning from 9 AM-2 PM. Then he will be in recovery for 3-4 hours before he is brought out. Then he will be in the pediatric cardiac ICU. He will be in recovery for 10-14 days. When he comes out of surgery, there is a 75% chance his sternum will have to remain open due to swelling for about 3-4 days. Because of this, they will heavily sedate him and also give him IV medicine to temporarily paralyze him to prevent any movement. When swelling is down, they will close his sternum with wires to hold it together. These will be permanent and not come out (we like to call our little super hero Iron Man! Seems fitting.) Then they will also close him up with stitches. He will also have a chest tube from below the sternum for 2-4 days after surgery.
12:20 PM
Eli still does not have feeding tube. They have been giving him IV nutrition/vitamins with everything he needs. This is because if he had anything in his stomach it would require more oxygen to go to stomach to digest it and they would rather his oxygen to to his more important organs. He's actually gained a tiny bit of weight from all the fluids they've given him.
X-ray was just done, upper lobe of lung is still collapsed.
6:12 PM
It is so hard to watch this little guy fight. Because of his breathing tube he is not able to cry, in fact the only time we have heard him cry was when he was born. He scrunches up his face and looks like he is crying but can't because of his breathing tube. It is the saddest thing and it makes us feel so helpless as his parents. We also have not seen his eyes at all yet...they have been closed this whole time.
9:15 PM
Daddy just gave Eli another priesthood blessing...it's amazing how much peace came into the room.
No comments:
Post a Comment