Today was Evin’s appointment
with the cardiologist from Cook Children’s.
She had an echocardiogram (ultrasound of the heart) and an EKG
(electrical activity of the heart) done.
She was so good during the appointment, which took about 2 hours, and
she only cried with they pulled the sticky leads off her chest. I would have cried too!
 |
| Waiting to have the EKG done. |
She got a good report from
the doctor and they are happy with how her body is responding to the
shunt. Her oxygen saturation was in the
high 90s and at one point was 100. This
would be great for normal babies, but for babies with a shunt, they would
rather this number be in the mid to high 80s.
She is doing a little too good
and they don’t want her to get overcirculated.
The shunt allows blood to
flow both forward and backwards into her lungs, which means that right now she
has a lot of blood flowing through them.
This means that her heart has to pump all this blood through and it could
be tiring her out. As a precaution, the
doctor decided to put her on a once a day dose of Lasix, a diuretic that will
cause some of this extra fluid to be excreted out of her body so her heart
won’t have to work quite so hard. While
I didn’t want Evin to have to be put on any more medication, I am extremely
happy that her little body won’t have to be working so hard.
I asked the doctor for a
recommendation of a good pulse oximeter that Mitch and I could purchase to
periodically check Evin’s oxygen saturation while we are at home. It would just give us peace of mind to be
able to check it when we want to. The
doctor said that she would put in a call to Cook’s Home Health and that they
would bring a pulse oximeter to our house that we could borrow! I am so glad I asked! They will be coming to our house tomorrow to
get it set up.
I asked if they had a time
frame in mind for the second surgery and she said they usually have it around 4 months old. She said it depends on Evin’s growth as to
whether it will be earlier or later than that.
This is what we were told before, but I thought I would try to get a
more definite answer out of her today.
No such luck!
Evin has been a happy girl
lately is and dishing out lots of smiles!
She loves to lay on the floor and stretch her legs while checking out
the scenery. In one of the pictures I
attached you can see her favorite sleeping position. She throws her head back which looks so
uncomfortable, but when I reposition her she goes right back to laying this
way! Silly girl!
We go to the pediatrician
this Friday for a weight check and then again on the 17th for her 2
month check up and shots. She will visit
the cardiologist again on 21st for another echo and EKG and will
have this done every month.
Thank you all for the
prayers!
Kori
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