Quick Annabelle Update

Clinic yesterday was so-so. They said she LOOKS good. Didn’t do lab work since we’d already done it when we were in the hospital, so no blood-letting for Annabelle, HURRAY! She was OH so thankful, I know!

They are still puzzled about her increased O2 requirement.

Plan as it stands for now is to give it a few weeks. Wean oxygen as she is able. If by the time her cast comes off, she is still having to have oxygen to keep her SAT’s up, then there is a good possibility they will schedule a heart-cath to see what is going on. (If her O2 requirement goes up or she has any issues before then, they would think about doing it sooner.)

Their thought is that it might be that one of her pulmonary arteries needs ballooned (they’d patched one of them to make them bigger in her June open-heart, however it was still smaller than it should be, so they knew ballooning might be needed in the future.)

They’ll also check for other pressure issues (checking for pulmonary hypertension) and something about a leak between the two sides, that part I didn’t quite understand. These things they wouldn’t necessarily “do” anything about, however would be knowledge to help us know how to treat her going forward.

I’m choosing not to think about it all right now. They aren’t concerned that there is an immediate problem, so I’m clinging to that. And if we are able to get her off oxygen again, then we can put off the heart-cath a little longer too. (She’ll get them done annually, I believe, for the rest of her life. Can we say YUCK?!?)

Thanks for your prayers this week! We really appreciate every one of them!