7/9/09

Tomas had a CT of his abdomen yesterday and didn't quite recover enough from the IV sedative to ge to go home afterward. So we stayed at the hospial last night.
He spent the night pretty well. His oxygen saturation dropped a few times, he needed oxygen at first but was taken off around 2am, after that he recovered on his own. The CT scan yesterday showed 3 things that need to be addressed. 1. Atelectasis - his lungs do not inflate properly or move air as well as they should. It causes some secretion buildup. He needed to be suctioned once last night. I am supposed to pat on his back to keep things from settling. It should go away as he gets older. 2. Urine distention of the bladder. This combined with the hydronephrosis from the other day is probably very indicative a a problem and will need to be addressed when he sees urology on the 15th. 3. The biggie: Morgagni hernia. A diaphragmatic hernia on the right side. His liver has pushed up into his chest cavity. It only accounts for 2% of diaphragm hernias (anyone surprised?) This one usually needs to be fixed. The combination of the reduced lung function, the hiatal hernia and the morgagni hernia are most likely contributing to his difficulty breathing. I am waiting to see whether surgery wants more tests before they discharge him. I'll let you all know. Dorothy Update: One of the senior surgeons does not feel that the morgangi hernia needs to be repaired any time soon. After reviewing the films from the CT scan he found (and these are his words) "Something bizarre" concerning the g-tube. It passes into the stomach, out of the stomach, and back into the stomach. He has never heard of it before and could not find a case study on it. My son - the trailblazer!!! He feels that is the main contributor to the abdominal swelling (and hence trouble breathing). His plan is to confirm what he saw with an endoscopy and then somehow repair it. It is a much less invasive plan than repairing the hernias so of course we are going to give that a try first. Update 2: We're home. The endoscopy is on July 20th.