Kadence hasn't really had high blood pressure any time she's come to Shriners. This time was different. She had high blood pressure from before the surgery, after the surgery and days after the surgery. The pediatrician assigned to Kadence tried to just wait it out. She thought that possibly Kadence's body was in more stress from the surgery than it appeared. She watched it for a few days, but it didn't budge at all. In fact, it got higher. Kadence stopped taking any pain meds at all because she was having no pain and yet her blood pressure was still high. The pediatrician said that she doesn't even like waiting to treat when there is a child with hypertension but she was trying to be patient. She started her on a blood pressure medication the Monday following her surgery and then ordered a kidney ultrasound be done. She said that the two main causes of hypertension in a child would be obesity or a kidney problem. Because Kadence has the opposite weight problem the dr was thinking her kidneys may be to blame. After talking with us some more she found out that Kadence had an umbilical line when she was born. I guess there are some links between having anything go through your belly button and kidney disease so this made her more alarmed. She ordered some labs as well to check the hormone levels of her kidneys. Kadence didn't even flinch and did so good! The kidney ultrasound needed to be done at Primary Childrens because Shriners doesn't have a dopler ultrasound. (no idea what that means, ha!) It was scheduled for a Tuesday which is a day that David is gone all day. He was willing to stay and help me, but I was pretty sure I could handle it. Kadence was SO nervous. No matter how many times we explained what would happen, she just got more and more nervous. She knew it wouldn't hurt but I think she could sense that the pediatrician thought something was wrong. I think she was more nervous about that than anything. Shriners had to shuttle us over to Primarys in their van and our driver was super nice. His name was Jake and Kadence actually remembers it which is a huge deal! Jake was a patient at Shriners years ago and now is their shuttle driver. He was so good to us and so helpful.
Kadence's wheelchair got all strapped in, but her wheelchair doesn't have a seatbelt which I found ironic. Kadence also needed to wear a neck brace which she didn't love but didn't complain about. I guess the neck isn't strong enough to hold up the hardware, especially when it hasn't really had to hold up any weight for a while. They do it so that there isn't any damage to the neck.
Transferring her was tricky, but the ultrasound lady was super helpful at doing what I asked her to do. we got Kadence all situated in bed and she did SO good!
She had me take pictures of the screen since she couldn't see it. Here is a picture of her kidney.
And here's a picture of her aorta
I asked the front desk if they could wait to call Jake until we had a chance to run to the gift shop. This may seem like a treat to many kids, but to a kid who hasn't left the same building for 6 days it was almost more of a treat to see new people than it was to get a gift. She picked a giraffe with a giraffe blanket for herself and a small cat for her sister. She was so brave and amazing at holding her breath so things went smooth....how do you not reward that?!
The labs came back and everything was normal. Her ultrasound came back and everything was normal. Basically they don't really know why her blood pressure went up. It doesn't seem to matter if shes awake or asleep, active or resting, sad or happy, in pain or not....it just stays the same. On the blood pressure medicine she is doing well. She is in the normal range now. She tends to stay on the high end of normal, but its normal so we can't complain! The pediatrician anticipates us going home on it. She wants to keep her on it unless it goes too low. If it goes too low she is just going to cut the dose in half, but keep her on the med. If it goes too low while on the half dose then she will take her off. If any of that happens while we are still at the hospital we might not go home with it, but for now our plan is to go home on the med and follow up on it. I'm so grateful for doctors who are in tune with what needs to be done in order to provide the best care for my baby.
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