ENT and VNS

Kaden is learning soo much every day. Over the weekend he learned he could reach his feet to his mouth and as you can see to the left he wants to sit up in his car seat and wiggle out of the arm straps. (when they are loose of course)

A few weeks ago I took Eli to the pediatrician because he seemed to be having an even harder time breathing than normal. He has always been a loud breather and a snorer. However, it seems to have been aggravated lately. They added Pulmicort to his nebulizer treatments as he was already on Xopenex. We have been doing this twice a day with no results. Dr. Chong (one of his pediatricians) suspected an enlarged adenoid as the culprit and suggested we see an ENT.

Not to my surprise Pediatric ENT’s are very busy and earliest appointment was five weeks from Dr. Chong’s referral. Not good for little Eli. I mean lets think about this...Child can’t breath...see him 5 weeks later...does that make sense? So, Dr. Chong had his people call their people and wua-am an opening in 7 days. Well, so we thought. Upon arrival the receptionist calls my name and says “Maam, your appointment is for the 24^th”, “ah, no” I exclaimed. Well, apparently an individual named Maurice told Dr. Chong’s office I had an appointment on 7/2 at 10:30, but it appears as if this Maurice does not have the authority to make appointments and seems to be a thorn in the office's side. So, after 30 seconds I kinda raised my eyebrows like well are you going to do something. So, they said “well, if you want to wait we can try to get you in” since the words wait and try were in the same statement I needed a little more. After some raised eyebrows between some of them and a head tilt back at me. I got a “how about 30 mins and Kosco (ENT Dr.) will see you”. Now that is what I am talking about. After that they were very kind and hussled around getting things in order for Kosco to see Eli. I maintained my cool and was as nice as I could be, but didn’t take no for an answer and it worked! Yippie. Dr. Kosco told us that yes, based on the X-ray of his throat and his breathing, we do have a situation. If we do nothing, Eli risks retracting (struggling to breath) then going into respiratory distress and then heart failure. Based on the options to “fix” it, it would require his tonsils and adenoids to be taken out. Also, he would want to cut back some of Eli’s palate to make more room for him to breath. Even though with normal kids this is a big surgery, it is done on an outpatient basis. However, with someone like Eli, it is a very BIG surgery. He won’t be able to eat for a long time and currently does not have a G-Tube. So, the ENT wants to consult with the gastro doctor and see what we can do. Eli might need either a Nasogastric (NG) G-Tube, which is temporary, or a regular G-Tube and then remove it afterwards. Also, he said kids like Eli sometimes just need a Tracheotomy. ARGH, ARGH, and a third ARGH. So, having said all that we are going to try some steroids for a week and see how that goes He thinks it will make his breathing better in about two days. The big question is how long will it stay good. Therefore, we have a follow up appointment in 4 weeks to see if the steroids keep the breathing good, and if not then we will have to do surgery.

As you can tell, our life is so easy and we have nothing on our plate (do you hear the sarcasm in my voice?). Eli totally needs the VNS surgery. We meet with Dr. Trumble (Neurosurgeon) and the big question is when. If everything was good, we could do it any Friday. But since Eli has this ENT issue, Dr. Trumble will not operate on him until it is all cleared up. Apparently, T&A issues cause a lot of infection and Dr. Trumble wants to steer clear of all that. So once the ENT stuff is done, healed and out of the way, Eli can then have the VNS.

The picture to the right is just a random shot while exploring Wal-Mart. Doing my strolls up and down the kid and diaper isles, this item caught my eye. All I have to say is I guess Wal-Mart carries it all! Very interesting item. Maybe if I buy one I can convince Fadi to teach the boys to leave the seat down.