Yesterday (day 3) was the best day Andrew has had all week. By the evening he had started to use his hands to eat Goldfish crackers and play with some cars. He was starting to smile more and just seemed happier.
Last night he had an overall good night. Daddy stayed with him while I went home to sleep. For the past several nights, we have both been staying with him. It felt great to go home and get a full nights sleep. John is going to be home tonight while I stay with Andrew.
This morning saw a few new developments… Some good but some a little interesting and confusing. The goood news is that his chest tube drainage was still trending down. The first 24 hours he was over 800 and the 2nd saw 700. The last 24 hours saw it decrease to about 500. Still a lot, but on the right track. However, today is going to break that trend. In the first 6 hours he put out about 200. This is what keeps kids in the hospital… Waiting around to stop draining. The good news is that it is still clear, so no low fat diet yet (they still expect Andrew to leak lymphatic fluid which is cloudy).
The interesting development is with Andrew’s blood work. His clotting factors were all out of whack this morning. The most concerning being his INR which helps dose his coumadin. He took his first dose Wednesday evening. His level yesterday morning was a little high, so they didn’t give him any yesterday. This morning his results stumped everyone. His INR was significantly increased and at a dangerous level. They are trying to figure out if there is some kind of drug interaction taking place. His levels should not have increased without a coumadin dose yesterday. Waiting to see what they figure out.
They were going to remove the IJ line in his neck today, but with such high INR levels, it is too risky and he could bleed way too much. So the line stays in until his levels come down. So the plan today is to get him out of bed and out of the room today. He sat in a chair for a couple of hours and this afternoon we are going to ride in the wagon and try to walk a little bit. He is really fussy today and his blood pressure is higher, so we are thinking that he may be hurting little bit. He is currently resting up (sleeping off the Morphine) before we head out on our wagon.
I think that we have figured out how to work around so e techie issues, so hopefully I will be able to post more.
