Going to Minneapolis

Brody develpped an air leak from his lung into his chest, so we are going by helicopter to Minneapolis.  He is stable and still turning the corner, but we want him down there in case he needs the backup support.  It is possible he could need a chest tube if the air builds up.  I will be off line for a while.

We are staying in St. Cloud tonight. He is getting oxygen into his system a little more and starting to get better. I need to close my eyes now.

Hope

Brody might be turning a corner. His oxygen saturation is now at 97%, the first real progress we've seen.  I don't know anything more than that right now, but this is a good sign.  It is nice to see the nurses smiling.

Doctor said Brody sounds better, but he is no where near better yet as far as oxygenation goes.  The Albuterol is giving him a high heart rate, so they are going to try a different drug with less cardio side effects.  The medical term was that it gave him tachycardia (high heart rate).  The issue is that it is only available in pre-mixed vials vs. the concentrate, so they do not have enough on site to keep him on a continuous neb.  If it works they will need to bring more in from another hospital.  If he does not turn the corner with this new drug in the next two hours, they are sending him to Children's.  At Children's, the treatment would be more of the same, but there would be the comfort of having a technology there that isn't available in St Cloud.  Not that he would need it, but the comfort of being near the cardic surgeons would be there.  The possibility would be a heart-lung bypass machine.  But we don't want to think about that.

His echo reading was good.  All for now, I'll keep posting as more comes our way.

There is no official word yet, but just judging from some discussions I overheard, Brody does not seem to be making a lot of progress.  He was given Ibuprofen for a fever and his heart rate is around 200-210.  They stopped the continuous albuterol about an hour ago, thinking that might have been the reason for the high heart rate.  But, it was expected that his heart rate would have gone down by now, so there is further discussion taking place about what else it might be. The Doctor came in the room, but Brody was getting a treatment so she was going to be right back after talking to Chip about his echo.  He woke up a little bit again and was flailing his arms around until he got more sedative.  The fever just read 100.1, a little higher despite the ibuprofen.  They are keeping a close eye on his temp.  Dr. just walked back in, so we should know more in a while.

Baby Steps

We are still in St. Cloud.  Brody's 2:00 blood gas was about the same as this morning. His CO2 is still high, in the 50's when they want it more in the 30's.  He is still on the acidic side of the pH scale.  He had a big diaper, which is good.  The respiratory technician did a technique with the ventilator to try to open up the air sacs in his lungs and he was oxygenating a little better after that.  He is now running at about 92% on his saturations vs. 89% earlier. His heart rate is high due to the continuous albuterol. It is at 202-209 right now.

He opened his eyes this afternoon and looked at us for a little while.  The nurse gave him a little more sedative and he went back to sleep.  They don't want him to fight the vent. 

No huge progress, but it seems to be getting a little better.  We will know more again at 6:00 when they draw blood again.

Update

The Doctor was just in and said Brody is stable.  He is not better and not worse.  She was encouraged that he was not getting worse.  They are re-starting the continuous albuterol neb through his tube.  They will draw blood again at 2:00 to test his blood gas levels.  His potassium was a little low this morning so they are giving him that.  The hope is that being aggresive with the continuous neb will help him turn the corner toward getting better.  At 6:00 they are drawing blood again to check the Vancomycin (antibiotic) level and potassium level in his blood.  Some time between now and then they will continue to decide whether to keep him here or send him down.  It sort of sounds like he will be staying here, at least for the afternoon.