2/27 - Evening Update

Max's blood gasses have continued to be too high.  They have decided to put him on the oscillating ventilator.  They did that this evening.  They would like his blood gasses to be 45-65, he last 3 were 79. 73 & 80.  After being on the new ventilator for an hour it dropped to 53.  This is good news.  I will keep you all posted on this, we hope that his blood gasses continue to stay down.

Update 2/27/11

Good news!!

The PDA meds seem to have worked.  The PDA is small enough now to not have to treat it at this point.  NO SURGERY!  This doesn't mean that it can't come back and we are in the clear, but it has worked enough to make the Dr. happy for now.

Max is still having his respiratory issues so they started him on a couple of asthma inhalers.  They will try these for a while and if he doesn't respond they will give him steroids through his IV.  This is all due to immature lungs. 

He did get another blood transfusion and this perked him up a bit and helped with his low blood pressure.  Since he is a micro preemie, he doesn't replenish is red blood cells as well as you or I would.   The transfusions are very common and work well for him.  After a blood transfusion they gave him a diuretic to help him pass some of the fluid he is retaining.  This is only done after a transfusion so hopefully this will work for him.  A lot of the weight he has gained is due to fluid retention. 

He is currently 920 grams, 2 pounds!!!  He is a chubby little guy.  His oxygen levels have been in the 40% range pretty regularly and he is at 55 BPM.  The have raised his feeding to 3 mils every 3 hours. 

They did do a full blood work up yesterday and thought they may have to give antibiotics again due to his white blood cell count being a bit "shifted".  The Dr. decided that the count wasn't shifted enough to call for them to have to give the antibiotics so that is great.

He opened his eyes for us agian.  Too cute!

Chispa

My baby girl didn't want me to forget how cute she was too.  :)

2/26/2011

Hallelujah!!

Old Blood Pressure Cuff

New Blood Pressure Cuff

(bottom of picture)

Just my cute little guy

Weight

I forgot to mention last time that Max is gaining weight nicely.  He is now 880 grams, that is approximately 1 pound 15 ounces.  I can't believe he is almost 2 pounds already.  It actually looks like he is getting a bit chubby.  His original blood pressure cuff is now

 too small, the velcro was popping off, he has graduated to the 2nd size.  You can definitely tell he is Dan's little boy.  :)

Just for comparison reasons here is a picture from the day he was born.  He was 1 pound 7 ounces.

Mason

I got to bring Mason home today.  It makes me very happy to have him home where he belongs.  :)

Not the best pictures, but I will have Cory do something creative so you can see his urn better, Mason deserves pictures much better than this.

Update 2/25 - 4:00pm Visit

He opened his eyes!!

Me taking his temperature

My Hand

Dan's Hand

Update 2/25/11 - 8:00am Visit

Not much of an update today.  I did hear during the Dr. rounds that he reponded a bit to the first round of PDA meds.  Obviously not enough to keep from doing the 2nd round, but a little bit is encouraging.  Of course I took a bunch more pictures.  Following are a few of them.  Hope you enjoy!!



Illustration of PDA

For more information click here

Update 2/24/11

They had to start the 2nd round of the PDA meds because he didn't respond to the first round.  If this round doesn't work then they will have to do surgery to correct it.  They will do another Echo on Saturday around noon so I will know more Saturday evening.  I was only able to make it in to see him once today due to weather so that is a super bummer.  I almost got to hold him today, but due to respiratory issues related to the PDA that has been delayed.