The title says it all. We went in on Thursday for Elijah's pre-Glen cath. It was fairly routine and the procedure itself went really well. He was able to stay on room air and the doctor didn't have to do any interventions. She was able to take all the pictures they needed and she got a great look at his heart. There is some narrowing of the shunt where it meets the artery, which means that he needs his next surgery (the Glen). When we got to recovery, he was on oxygen but sleeping. As he woke up, he was very agitated and started thrashing about. They tried tylenol but it didn't really do anything. They gave him some morphine and that seemed to relax him. He refused his bottle and just fell asleep in my arms. Things looked good so we were then transferred to CV Acute for observation for the night. For the next couple of hours I held him to keep him calm but his oxygen levels kept dropping and coming back up. Dion came with Noah and my sister joined us. Things were looking positive.
Dion left with Noah and that's when things got crazy. The little guy's oxygen levels were dropping and they weren't coming back up. The nurse started looking a little frantic and the charge nurse came in to help. They called the doctor for the floor but she didn't come. They waited and tried everything they could to help him but nothing was working. I picked him up and tried to calm him but his oxygen levels would not come up.
At that point the the nurse called the Rapid Response Team. If you aren't familiar with this term, this is the team of doctors and nurses that respond to code blue. That was one of the most frightening moments of my life. The nurse tells me that there are about to be a lot of people in the room. She wasn't kidding. The doctor finally comes and she and the nurse have a little argument and the room fills with people. When I counted, there were 15 people in his room. They surrounded his bed and orders were shouted across the room. They started pumping him full of fluids, oxygen, and morphine. The x-ray team showed up and blood was taken. His oxygen levels were still not responding. They started talking about needing to move him to the PICU or the CTICU because they were running out of interventions they could do on the floor. One of the nurses told me to pack my stuff, and we would be moving in a bit. The room was still full of people. A social worker came to check on me and the doctors started to explain that they weren't sure what was going and that they may need to intubate him in order to breath for him. The next thing I know, they are throwing monitors on his bed and rushing him to the CTICU.
When we get to the CTICU, it is full of nurses. They are frantically preparing his room and getting all the medications ready. Several nurses move him to his new bed and they start efforts to get him to breath better. Things were being thrown on the ground and everyone was moving at a fast pace. They were finally able to get his oxygen levels up, although not where they should have been.
He is still in the CTICU and needing assistance to breath. They would like get him breathing on his own, or with a little assistance, so that they could send him home to gain a little weight before his next surgery. He only weighs 10lbs and ideally he would weigh 16lbs or so. However, right now, sending him home doesn't seem to be likely. The other option is to move forward with the Glen next week. The downside to that, beside him being so little, is that his surgeon is completely booked next week. I trust his surgeon and it scares me to put my little baby in the hands of someone else.
We should know within the next 24 to 48 hours what the long term plan will be. I ask anyone who reads this to please keep our little guy in your thoughts and prayers.
Stay strong! Sending you positive energy.
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