25 Sep Update
Today was a busy day but all in all I think it was a good one. Keegan was able to get the venus line in his femoral blood vessel. This is good because it will set thing up to take the two sensing lines, the ones that were causing the clot, out of his heart. They ended up taking the umbilical line out but nothing else. They are going to wait to pull those other lines out because some of his other blood labs weren’t just right. They have been constantly thinning his blood to keep the clot from growing. Not they want to get it a little thick to keep him from bleeding when they remove those lines.
Right now his kidney function is improving. He is no longer on the diuretic that was making him pee so much. His lab number on his kidneys do point to the fact that he is filtering better though. We also learned that after the chest is closed, the lungs typically face a the toughest time recovering. Keegan’s are actually doing better then they expected and on several occasion they have been able to dial down the amount of oxygen he has been on.
The part of Keegan that the doctors and nurses are watching closer then anything is his little heart and the clot in his right atrium. After closing up the chest the heart has to contend with a smaller place to operate. This can create problems with blood pressure and heart rate. They have been keeping him full of fluid, platelets and blood. Because of that it has been keeping him pretty swollen. Apparently swollen doesn’t always mean you have enough fluid. The fluid they need him to have is the kind that is actually pumping through him, not just gathering in his abdomen or head. Right now they are “playing the fluid game” to help balance his heart rate and his blood pressure. As for the clot they have elected not to take any evasive action to remove it. They have instead elected to watch it daily with a chest echo and to follow it with thinning agents and asprin. This will allow the body to attack it with out it growing and will thus dissolve over time.
In the meantime my father, Mark, has the watch tonight (thanks Dad). Maddie is going home after a very long two days and we are getting dinner courtesy of her friends at the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office. They are bringing it over to her grandparents house where we are staying. Say a prayer as always and know that Maddie and I appreciate you all so much. Thank you for being such great friends
Gray