Not just yet.....

June 20

Friday

Change of plans. We were called this morning, nice and early, by a nurse from Texas Childrens. Aleia had another episode last night in which her stomach was distended and she got to doing poorly. So she is not being transferred today and they are having a surgical consult come by and check her out. So Tami and I get dressed and hit the road. Ashlynn goes to daycare and Wanda stays in BCS for Ashlynn. When we get there the surgeon is just starting to review Aleia’s charts and information. She asks us a few questions and then tells us some possibilities. There is of course the possibility for NEC, or some other infection, or a small perforation in her intestine, or a disease called Hirschsprungs’s Disease or lastly just a premature intestinal system that needs more time to develop and strengthen. A few of those possibilities could lead to surgery. The surgeon tells us these things but says she has not yet reviewed any of Aleia’s x-rays or films from the last week. She will look at those and let us know. In the mean time, Aleia is back to IV Fluids and no food. So she may not be happy about that for a while. She was not doing too bad for the most part today. Her belly was big, but the surgeon told us it was not very bad and that she had seen much worse on others. That was a relief to Tami and I; to us it looks like it’s about to pop. She assured us it was well within acceptable range. But Aleia is still in a crib bed and seems to be fairing ok. Not overly active but not too limp either.

So later the surgeon looks at Aleia’s films, etc. and then discusses the case with the head surgeon and states that it all looks good. So she ordered a biopsy of Aleia’s colon/rectal area. Basically they are going to take some sample tissue from her rectum and run some test on it for the Hirschsprung’s Disease. According to the surgeon, this is a precautionary process of elimination. They performed this test afternoon about 3 pm. They did not get the results back today. So hopefully they will have them by tomorrow, but the weekend may put a kink in that according to the surgeon. So once again we are back to “wait and see”. What a wonderful game

When we left this evening she was not as distended and seemed to be pretty fussy about not being fed. These are pretty good signs as far as we can tell….. But Aleia will be in Houston for at least 2-3 more days and possibly more depending on the outcome of the tests.

OH. So I guess yesterdays delays could possibly be viewed as a good thing.