Friday, November 17, 2006

Phew! She has a G-Tube.

Just updating somewhat quickly before I head back to the hospital for the rest of the night. We arrived at the hospital around 9. she was a direct admit into the peds unit, 8west. We settled in quickly and played the hurry up and wait game for the next few hours. They took her vital signs, got her prior medical history and anesthesia history from us and weighed her. She weighed in at 13 lbs. 10 oz. So, she has gained 2 oz. in about 2 1/2 weeks. (Keep in mind she is on 24 calorie formula). Anyways, she had a OR slot for 12:30p.m.

We were taken down to pre-op around 11:30. She hadn't had an I.V. started or anything so we just played the waiting game there as well. We met both anesthesiologists (one really fell in love with Emma) and they explained what they were going to do. They decided with her prior history of having problems being extubated and coming out of anesthesia that they were going to do a modified "conscious sedation". She was put out with gas, but was not administered any narcotics. The procedure was done with a local anesthetic. She was only given a tylenol suppository after the surgery for pain. She was ordered morphine but as far as I know has not been given any. That will change when I get back to the hospital!The procedure itself only took about 20 minutes or so but the lady who fell in love with Emma decided to "drag out" her time in the OR to make sure they wouldn't have any problems. she wanted her FULLY awake before heading to post-op recovery. She did fine with extubation. She had a few "blue spells" where she needed stimulation and they kept her on oxygen until she went into the recovery room about 30 minutes later. Her anethesiologist followed her there and stayed with us another half hour. When she got into post-op they called one of us back so I went while Sean stayed in the waiting room. Emma was quite upset (and hungry) so I rocked her and we made a make-shift pacifier out of a bottle nipple stuffed with gauze and taped. She doesn't take pacifiers but this dipped in glucose water seemed to do the trick. We kept her on "blow-by' oxygen for another 30 minutes. I asked them to bring back sean after about 15 minutes. I was supposed to leave, but I layed low and nobody said anything. After about an hour and a half we got to go back up to her room. We got her all settled in and talked to her doctor a bit about after care. I've done so much research that most of it was just review. We got her content in bed and then Sean and I left so we could go see the kids and grab dinner (Caden was at preschool and Grandpa picked him up and Lily was with Grandpa since last night).
Sean and I had a nice dinner at Woodranch (a good steakhouse) and then met up with Grandpa and the kids. We came home shortly after to put the kids in bed. I have a few things to get together and then I'll be heading back to the hospital. Emma currently has 2 lvns and an RN asssigned to her since she tends to be "high maintenance" while in the hospital so I'll be heading back to relieve them and spend some time with my baby.
On a side note we're having trouble with the Home health care people and coordinating getting a pump. They tried to deliver the WRONG pump last night while we were gone. I called them and they were supposed to call back and never did. Then we spoke with our case manager today who said she ordered the Zevex pump NOT the Kangaroo and said she'd call somebody and to call them tomorrow for it. When we got home Apria had delivered 25 pump bags for the kangaroo pump and left them on our doorstep. UGGH. I hate dealing with Apria. This is the same company who took 5 months to pick up a breastpump and couldn't seem to show up after schedule MORE than 6 pick-up dates. This should be interesting. Her G-tube looks great along with the site.
Here's a link to some pictures from today. Hopefully, it works!
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v225/munkeesmama/G-Tube%20Surgery/?action=view¤t=G-tubeSurgery009.jpg&slideshow=true&interval=3

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