Slow Progress

5:30 ap.m. Rachel took the shift from about 11 to 4:30, since I had been up since about 2 a.m.  Ginny is so active, despite the sedation,  that someone really has to stay on top of her or she'll get a hold of something somehow. When a new nurse or RT comes on, they always say the same thing, "Oh, she's so cute."  Don't let that fool you.   You might see a cute three year old in a hospital bed, but you let your guard down and you might just find yourself in a steel cage match when you least expect it.

She's been making some progress overnight,  but its been slow. Her oxygen is now hovering around 90 to 91, but that is still on 50% support through the vent, and still 20 ppm on the NO.  They have reduced the vent settings to allow her to breathe more on her own, which she's doing a good job of. We've also added a therapy called CPT to break up the junk in her lungs.  When she was in the NICU it consisted of wacking the crap out of her with what looked and sounded like a rubber mallet.  Now that she's bigger, weve gone industrial strength. Instead of a rubber mallet,  we use a pneumatic device that sounds like a weed wacker and works like a vibratory pavement breaker . It's really good at loosening the junk in her lungs so we can suction it out.  She likes the hammer, she HATES the suction.

8:47 a.m. POOP! Yay, POOP!  Ginny hadn't had one since Wednesday some time.  With all the stress and drugs and everything, it would be normal to be constipated, but we were starting to get worried. This morning she gave up a little stone turd.  It's the little things....  9:25 a.m. Does anyone think it's ironic that today also happens to be World Toilet Day?

Water for People

12:00 p.m.  Rounds were finished a few minutes ago.  Good news. We're going to reduce Ginny's vent setting to 10 breaths per minute to get her to breathe mostly on her own, reducing the nitric from 20 ppm to 10 ppm. It looks like we might not hit our 48 hour goal from yesterday, but we may be able to extubate 48 hours from now. I hope its at night when David is on so he can see her better.