Day by day....

Posted Oct 15, 2007 1:37pm

Hello everyone,
It has been a couple of days since the last update, due to computer issues at hospital, but over those days boy have things changed. We will do this day by day.

Saturday - Aunt Missy came to visit that day. Jenna had all of her drips stopped and taken out. She still has the Central Line in her collarbone and an IV in her right hand. From a Cardiac stand point, she was cleared and we were moved to step down. In step down, she began to drop in her saturation levels that evening. They said that she still had quite a bit of fluid in her lungs on xray, so they felt that an extra dose of Lasix would be the best treatment at this time. Since coming into the hospital she had gained two pounds of fluid at this point. She was already on IV Lasix three times a day and Diuril twice a day to help git rid of some of the fluid. She was trying to cough quite a bit, but it was not going anywhere. We were told that the levels were dropping due to the congestion in her lungs, and the fluid not moving out of her lungs. At certain points her levels were dropping into the 40's and 50's, normal for her is 75-85. So, she finally settled enough around midnight on Saturday, so we decided to leave and get some rest. At this point she was still getting Tylenol with Codeine for pain every four hours and Morphine as a breakthrough medicine for pain in between if needed. She was getting five ounces of formula via pump every four spanned over an 1 1/2 hours when given.They felt this may be too much since she was still gaining fluid in her lungs. Also, Daddy got the chance to hold baby girl for the first time.

Sunday - Today she was still having trouble with her oxygen levels, at one point she dipped to 32. She had began to show signs of circulation problems also, her toes and fingers were turning blue and also her lips. During rounds, Dr. Manning (one of her surgeons) felt that she was getting too much feeds via ounce, so he lowered her amount to 3 1/2 ounces over the same amount of time via pump. He also did not want her to receive any more Morphine so she would not need it continuously. Also, a large concern for her was that she had not had a bowel movement since Thursday and they felt this may be hindering her breathing her stomach had become quite distended at this point. So they ordered suppositories and also stool softners to help. They said that sometimes the stomach falls asleep after surgery and does not want to work. Once the medicines were given, she felt much better later that day. They were also concerned because her input of liquid was still higher than her output of urine. They also decided to keep her on IV Lasix another day to help with the fluid. Another chest xray was done that evening, to look at her fluid level in the right lung. At that time, there had been no change from the day before. At this point her goals to leave to go home were to take at least 50% of her original intake of formula by mouth, have oxygen levels of 75% or greater on room air, and an improved chest xray. She is set to have an echo done on Monday to make sure everything is working properly after surgery.

Monday- Today, we arrived just in time to participate in rounds with the doctors on the floor. She had improved through the night, her urine output was tremendous according to the nurses. The doctors were thrilled with how well she was doing. She had lost a pound since weighing her initially upon arrival. She was down from 14.08 pounds to 13.15 pounds. We were thrilled. Also, she had only dipped in her oxygen once in the night and it was because she was upset and would not calm down. All the other times that she was dropping was when she was relaxed and sleeping. They decided to place her on Lasix by mouth and another water pill also by mouth, she will most likely go home on both of these medicines. Also, they had changed her pain medicines to Ibuprofen and Tylenol by mouth. She was improving quite well.

She still had the tube in her nose for feeding, but the doctors felt that it may be hindering her so they decided to have us attempt to feed by mouth and to go ahead and pull the tube. We fed her intially this am, and she did awesome. She took three ounces by mouth for me. I was so proud, this afternoon she took three and a half ounces for Justin. She is doing very well. They got her all bathed and cleaned up and she looks great. She was playing up until a little while ago and enjoying herself quite a bit. Now she is sleeping, I guess the playing wore her out. The doctors want to watch her with the oxygen levels (she is currently on 3/4 Liter via cannula down from three the other night), with her eating, and her chest xrays for the next couple of days. If she continues to do well, the goal is to send her home by Wednesday of this week. We are thrilled that she is striving so well now. We knew it might take a couple of days, but she is tough. She also had her echo done today, which we have not heard the results from that test yet. Hopefully everything is going well.

We will continue to keep everyone posted as we can. Thanks so much for your thoughts and prayers during this time. Talk soon.

Jenny, Justin and Jenna