3:00pm. The nurse came in just a bit ago and said things were going fine. They’ve replaced all that was needed. Now they are monitoring him for a bit before they close him back up. She said that she’d come back around 5’ish to let us know how the close up went. We should be able to see him sometime after that and then again around 8’ish. Visiting hours for him are once every few hours for a half-hour and then only two people can visit at a time. That’s probably a good thing, though, as I’m sure he’ll need his rest. He should be pretty “out-of-it” for the next day or two.
When the nurse came with the update she brought a mechanical valve and some Dacron tubing so we could see what it looks like. The tubing is cloth like - almost like a small horizontally-ribbed sock (sans the foot section). The mechanical valve is made of what looks like black plastic. [They say the valve was made in MN] Two half-circles within a circle. The two half-circles pivot to allow blood to pass through one way but not the other. When the mechanical valve closes you can hear a small click. When he is closed up you will be able to hear the click through a stethoscope.
Melissa said, “Oh, Marla, now you’ll be able to fall asleep on his chest to the sounds of clicking.” We all thought that was cute. Of course, we don’t know if you’ll be able to hear the click without the stethoscope. :)
4:20pm. She said they’re just about to close him up. His heart has been beating on its own for about an hour now. They’re thickening up his blood up a bit cause it thinned out a bit - no big deal. Things are going very well.
6:20pm. A different lady came in and said they are closing him up right now. I thought they’d be done by now. But, maybe the last lady was overly optimistic, or I misunderstood her. Either way, he should be done ASAP. This lady says everything went great. We’ll be able to see him at around 8:00pm. I think we’re waiting around for the surgeon to come down and give us the final update.
We’ve been watching T.V. Seinfield, Everybody Loves Raymond, and we’ve been playing video games. Marin has been a good little trooper. She can’t seem to go as long as us as far as food goes. We’re starting to get hungry. Marla says this is the longest she’ll have been away from the Shrub Dog [Well, she called him Rob] once the recovery period has passed (and not counting the 30 minute visits).
They have internet plug-ins here, but they aren’t working. So, you probably won’t get this update until we drive by the hotel. Hopefully that’s soon, because, like I mentioned above, we’re getting hungry.
7:45pm. The surgeon comes in. [I had a little dinner at the cafe - so I missed his first few words] He says things went well. Says there is still stuff that will have to be worked on later on, but the aortic arch was the most important thing to take care of. Rob is still on a respirator.
They won’t know about brain functionality until tomorrow - or at least not until he wakes up. The platelets in his bloodstream are mostly gone (due to the body cooling) so are they replacing them currently. Because of the lack of platelets his blood isn’t clotting as quick as they were hoping. But things are going well.
8:00pm. Still not closed up completely (I’m guessing those reporting nurses aren’t as clear on what’s going on as we would hope - maybe that’s good, though. Since we originally heard the surgery would take 6-8 hours). As his body warms the bleeding slows. His body was cooled to about 60-70 degrees. The surgery took about fourteen hours. They had him open for about twelve hours.
We might be able to see him in an hour - but he’ll be sleeping (i.e. drugged up).
9:00pm. Dad and Marla went back to see him. They’re still trying to stop a little bleeding. But, they’re getting him all balanced out and fixed up. The goal is to keep him sedated throughout the night.
No comments:
Post a Comment