Tom has now fully recovered from his cardiac surgery and the doctors are happy the operation was a success. This is amazing news and a huge sigh of relief for us :) He doesnt need any oxygen during the day, but unfortunately hes still needing some at night. This is because his oxygen saturations are having sharp dips overnight, sometimes down to between 30 and 40%. A detailed sleep study was done on Tom a couple of weeks ago and in amongst the birthday celebrations on Monday, the ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat) consultant came to see us with a plan for Tom and his airway. The sleep study pointed to Tom obstructing (his airway blocking) when in deep sleep - this is called sleep apnea and is likely what is causing the oxygen dips. They want to use a scope to look down Toms airway to see what might be causing this, which needs a general anaesthetic. One of the usual first steps they take with children with this issue is to remove their tonsils and adenoids - so to avoid having to give Tom two general anesthetics in what would likely be a short time, they will remove these on the same day they do the scope. Tom is on aspirin to thin his blood, so needed to switch to another medication a week before the op, or he could end up with a big bleed during surgery. It takes a week for aspirin to come out of the system, so he was changed to a new blood thinner yesterday which he has to get by twice daily injections. I had similar ones after Tom was born because of complications from my cesarean section and they were very stingy so I know how unpleasant this is for Tom! On Thursday next week theyll take Tom to theatre for his operation. Recovery will take a week or so and we should be able to tell within that time whether its helped stop the oxygen dips. If not, theyll do more tests and look at what other options there are. In the meantime we will remain in the high dependency ward for the doctors to keep a close eye on Tom. We had so hoped after the heart surgery we would be able to ride off into the sunset, taking Tom to have some peaceful time at home for us all to recover. We hope that will come soon enough though and after all Tom has been through in the last year, as long as he is safe and well, we are blessed and happy. Were using the time till his op to do some work with the physio and occupational therapist on Toms development, and have reviews with doctors from other specialist areas which will hopefully save some outpatient appointments later. And Tom is loving all the play time and attention as usual and is full of smiles and giggles as usual :) Very proud of my boy xx
Posted on: Fri, 08 Nov 2013 15:10:42 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015