Surgical update 3/3/09

I just called the nurse. His blood pressure, hemocrit (red blood cell count) and urine output are down again. He needs another IV in case he needs a blood transfusion. I think this is a sign that he does not respond well to surgery. I did mention to the neurosurgery attending physician and the anesthesiologist, before surgery, that all that happened with the PDA surgery. They did not know if this would happen again since they "were not doing surgery on the heart". Hopefully he will pull through this. He might need blood pressure support medications again which can interfere with thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) results. Oh by the way his newborn screen came back positive for hypothyroidism which can be attributed to the blood pressure medication, the physical stress (CPR) he endured or a true medical condition. Good news: he no longer requires pediatric cardiology care, weight is up to 3 pounds (hopefully healthy weight gain and not fluid retention),less ventilator support today and the breast milk supply is plenty. Wow it's amazing that a human being that weights only 3 pounds can have so many medical conditions. This child has endured more medical and surgical interventions in his first month of life than I have in my 34 years. The only major surgery that I ever had was the C-section. Please pray that he will recover from surgery and be his spunky self again, that the fluid on his brain resolves, blood pressure increases, decreased ventilator needs so he can be weaned to a less invasive way to maintain breathing and that he can have breast milk (we are running out of freezer space at the NICU and Fisher House). Glenn will probably take some back to Bremerton next week when he reports to work.