Getting closer to surgery

Briana is doing well today. When we walked in this morning, she was on 30% oxygen, which seems to be her lowest tolerable setting on the oscillator. She goes back and forth between the 30% and 50% range, lower being better. At 30% this morning, her oxygen and carbon dioxide levels are good, so it would be safe to say she is gaining some ground. The nurse told us her scans this morning showed that she has some fluid on the outside of her lungs, as well as throughout her body, which is normal with the oscillator and not being able to move much. They want to get her to excrete the extra fluid, so they are giving her a concentrated protein medication which will help her body to pull the fluid from her cells, and with the Lasix, cause her to urinate them out. If she is able to excrete excess fluid, then this will help her hypertension, and they may try to get her off of the oscillator today, and back onto a conventional respirator, which is definitely a good step.

They let Briana do her own thing for the past three days, and just monitored her and kept her on a straight course. I think that Thursday night's little setback slowed down their treatment approach, which was definitely a good plan, because it gave her some time to adjust and plateau. Today, they think she is ready to slowly resume moving forward again. Their are no solid dates set for corrective surgery yet, but it should be this week.