Monday 10/26/09 we had a Fetal Echocardiogram and an appointment.
The echocardiogram was a little painful, they had me lay on my back for over an hour and the nurse was pushing pretty hard on my belly. When we finally say the doctor, he said that he didn’t see much change from the last one. Because she is getting so much bigger, it’s harder for them to see the heart, he said the bigger she gets the less they are going to be able to see. He said that everything appears to be functioning properly. He said he still cannot tell whether there is a hole or not, but it doesn’t seem to be the main concern at this point. Again they said when she is born, they will do an Echocardiogram right on her chest so they can see whatever they need to at that point.
We also had our regular routine visit to Dr. Nosovitch’s office. They said everything is going great, there is good movement, and fluid levels are great. I asked Dr. Nosovitch if he could give me a date that he would induce, and he said probably Wednesday 12/2/09, but not definite. Well at least we have a tentative date.
Monday 11/2/09 update: Not too much to report on for this appointment. Mackenzie came with us to the appointment and while I was on the monitor Briana was kicking like crazy. The nurse told Mackenzie that she hears her voice because she is moving. Mackenzie was very good and all the nurses loved her.
Wednesday 11/4/09 update: We met with the Pediatric Surgeon, Dr. Ratner. He was very informative and nice. He asked when my due date was, and I told him 12/9/09 but Dr. Nosovich was going to induce 12/2/09 tentative. He seemed to think I wouldn’t make it to those dates, because CDH babies come a little early. I am at 34 weeks now. I am hoping that everything keeps going well and that she doesn’t come early, but I am ready whenever. She is still VERY active.
Dr. Ratner explained to us the procedures, which some we knew and he answered our questions as best he could.
When Briana is born, they will stabilize her immediately, using one of three breathing methods. Once that happens, he said it could take 5-7 days of stabilization before surgery will be done. If she has to be put on ecmo (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) http://oce.sph.unc.edu/phnceac/babyguide/ecmo.pdf, which is the heart/lung bypass machine it could be longer.
The surgery will take about 2 ½ hours. After surgery, he said the time frame could be 3 weeks to 3 months in the hospital depending on the severity of her defect. He said he will check our last sonogram and see what is in the chest cavity to help determine how big the hole may be. But again, he won’t know until he goes in how severe the defect is. We told him the last sonogram we had, Dr. Nosovitch told us that he didn’t see the liver up there anymore. He said that would be good. He sounded very confident that things will go smoothly. We are just praying that he is right.
I will probably not update for a couple weeks again, because next week 11/9/09 should be pretty routine again, and the following week 11/16/09 is our next/last sonogram (unless they need to do more). I will update after the sonogram.
Thank you all for being supportive. We will keep the updates coming, even if I have to have my sisters update the blog.
~Angela
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