Cardiology Check Up

Clayton had his six month cardiology visit this morning. I'd worked myself into a knot with anticipation, but everything went well, and there were no surprises.

Stats:

Weight: 26.5 lbs (up a whole pound in the last month!!!!)

Height: 34 inches (up 1/2 inch in the last month!!!!)

Oxygen Sat: 85% (excellent for Clayton)

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At today's apointment Clayton had an EKG.

All smiles until the stickers had to come off. Ouch!

Then there was an echo.

Holding tightly to "Mack" from Disney's Cars.

Echos are always a little scary for Clayton, but he did a really good job laying still.

Finally we were done with all the tests.

Gold fish can cure just about anything.

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The dreaded "F" word (F for Fontan) was then discussed. Clayton's heart looked pretty much unchanged from his last appointment, which is good. He still has leaks in the tricuspid and neo-aortic valves, but we know about those, and they're not troublesome at this time. Clayton's weight gain is also a big plus, as they want him as close to 30 pounds as possible. Our cardiologist believes the best time for Clayton's Fontan will be in the first half of next year. He will be sending today's notes to the team at Stanford to see if they agree.

The Fontan is the second half of Clayton's last surgery, the Glenn (also called a hemi-Fontan). His first surgery, the Norwood, was basically a temporary rerouting of bloodflow until the body can handle the Glenn and Fontan procedures. Before the surgery, Clayton will also need a cardiac cath to ensure the pressures in his heart are ideal for a Fontan. At this point, we do not have any reason to believe he would not be a candidate. We talked a little today about the pros and cons of doing the cath in Oklahoma vs out at Stanford. We'll have to think about that one.

Overall, there wasn't really anything new, which is good, but all this Fontan talk makes my stomach upset. I really hate that my sweet little boy will have to have open heart surgery soon, again. It will be our sixth open heart surgery with the boys, and this will by far be the most challenging for us. Clayton will be well aware of everything, and that will be difficult to see. Unfortunately when you hang around the CVICU as long as we have, you see a lot. I know we've seen several Fontans go well, but I also know that we've seen a few go terribly wrong, and that is hard to handle.

Four chambers sure would have been nice. I need to do a better job trusting in God's plan for Clayton.

PS Clayton got his cast off last Thursday. They were actually able to just slide it right off, which was not really supposed to happen. It's a good thing Clayton hadn't figured that out. I would have just died if he had taken it off himself one day.