Hey everyone. Before I start, Ellie is doing just fine. The reason for no update yesterday, Ellie was having one of her best days in the past couple weeks and we were just focusing on her. Her oxygen was lower than it has been in days and she was awake and looking more alert than ever. We were loving it. She is such a strong little thing and amazes us everyday.
In the past couple of days, there have not been too many changes with Ellie medication wise. They did go up on her pain medicine. Since Ellie is getting bigger (she is almost 10 pounds as of last night!), she was starting to outgrow the level of medication they had her on for her pain. This resulted in her heart rate going up and staying up. Even when they would give her an extra dose of the medicine, her heart rate still would not come down. After talking to several nurses, nurse practitioners, and the doctors they increased her medicine. Since then she has been a whole different baby. The level of oxygen they have had to give her has gone down each day. Her oxygen saturation levels are staying high, which impresses the doctors. For example, a baby with no heart defects should have a level of around 100 all the time. Since Ellie has 3 holes in her heart, they are happy if she is in the 85-95 range. She is staying in the upper 90's most of the time. That is excellent for her.
Today, they did a echocardiagram on her heart and had blood labs drawn on her for her heart cath on Thursday. This is all just preliminary before the heart cath. The pulmonary hypertension specialist has also come in to check on her the past couple of days. We have not met this doctor yet but should on Thursday. He comes in very early in the morning before we arrive. My hope and prayer is that he see something the other doctors didn't that will help Ellie. The other positive thing is that Ellie is looking better than ever. When you look at her, its hard to believe she is one of the sickest kids in the NICU.
Please continue to pray for Ellie's upcoming heart cath on Thursday. Pray for the procedure to go well and for good results. Please also pray for our new friends, Jennifer and George and their little boy, Jaxson. Jaxson is having surgery on his skull on Thursday. Pray for a smooth surgery for Jaxson. We have become good friends with this wonderful family. It's so good to have people to relate to right here in the NICU. I know they would appreciate your prayers.
Hope you all have a wonderful day and thank you again for all of your prayers, encouragement, and support. It truly means so much to us.
Love,
Ellie's Mommy
