So much for stability. Will dealt with blood pressure troubles all day, which meant a day of many different potential fixes. By the time we left tonight, things seemed to be headed in the right direction.
It's no surprise that he'd be dealing with this, as it has happened before when he loses a lot of weight by peeing off excess fluid. That tends to drop his vascular pressures and hence his blood pressure. To be safe, they started him on antibiotics and took blood and urine cultures because an infection could also be the culprit. Then again, increasing his dopamine and giving him some IV fluids, which they did, can also get him back on track. They stopped his feeds again because they don't want to introduce anything new for him to work on if he does have an infection. If initial tests don't point to an infection, they could restart the feeds as soon as Saturday morning. We'll see. He was still tolerating them well, which is a good sign.
Add to all that the fact that he had another eye exam today, and it was a bit of a rough one for Will all told. None of the babies like that exam, from what we're told, and I can't say I blame them. The ophthalmologist pries open his eyes after the nurses already have done so to put in dilating drops, and takes a look to see if he can detect any problems. So far, Will's eyes have been OK, but really too immature to see much of anything anyway. They're going to start doing the exams weekly rather than every other week, so that must mean they're getting to the point where they think they can see more.
Even though he had some setbacks, they seemed minor overall. His chylothorax continues to be a trickle, and his x-rays have been good. They've gone down on his ventilator pressures again, and he seems to be breathing pretty well. He won't lose any weight today because his output has slowed quite a bit and they gave him fluid for his blood pressure, but he shouldn't be up much either. We hope this is just a plateau as they catch up with the significant changes he has undergone this week, and that he can start making progress again soon.
It's no surprise that he'd be dealing with this, as it has happened before when he loses a lot of weight by peeing off excess fluid. That tends to drop his vascular pressures and hence his blood pressure. To be safe, they started him on antibiotics and took blood and urine cultures because an infection could also be the culprit. Then again, increasing his dopamine and giving him some IV fluids, which they did, can also get him back on track. They stopped his feeds again because they don't want to introduce anything new for him to work on if he does have an infection. If initial tests don't point to an infection, they could restart the feeds as soon as Saturday morning. We'll see. He was still tolerating them well, which is a good sign.
Add to all that the fact that he had another eye exam today, and it was a bit of a rough one for Will all told. None of the babies like that exam, from what we're told, and I can't say I blame them. The ophthalmologist pries open his eyes after the nurses already have done so to put in dilating drops, and takes a look to see if he can detect any problems. So far, Will's eyes have been OK, but really too immature to see much of anything anyway. They're going to start doing the exams weekly rather than every other week, so that must mean they're getting to the point where they think they can see more.
Even though he had some setbacks, they seemed minor overall. His chylothorax continues to be a trickle, and his x-rays have been good. They've gone down on his ventilator pressures again, and he seems to be breathing pretty well. He won't lose any weight today because his output has slowed quite a bit and they gave him fluid for his blood pressure, but he shouldn't be up much either. We hope this is just a plateau as they catch up with the significant changes he has undergone this week, and that he can start making progress again soon.
posted by John Kenyon at 10:47 PM
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