17 Sep Afternoon Update
They are beginning the ECMO wean in a few minutes. As Gray wrote earlier this morning, they will reduce the amount of work the ECMO is doing (by about half) and see how his heart responds. We are optimistic about the results, but it is still early. We are not expecting a miracle today. Of course, we will let you know the results.Since he woke up, we have been spending a lot of time with him. Unfortunately, he has become overstimulated and hyperactive, which is not good for his recovery or the ECMO. Considering his circumstances, it’s hard to remember sometimes that he is not even a week old yet and should be sleeping almost 18 hours. He can still have visitors, but we will need to keep them short. We want to keep the doctors letting him have visitors, so please just be aware that visitation may just be with us depending on the time. We need visitors too though!Keegan was placed on the heart transplant list today. This is just a precaution for now. It took the last 5 days for us to complete the candidacy checklist and become “listed”. Obviously if we waited until he absolutely needed a heart to begin the checklist, precious time would be lost. The doctors could leave him on ECMO for up to 2-3 weeks before we would actively await a new heart. The ECMO weans will tell us alot as to how great the need is. If a heart becomes available within the next few weeks, we will weigh the options at that point.Don is on ECMO, and Marilee is on CVVH today. They have a hard day’s work today with the wean, so keep them in your prayers also. Thanks for everything.