The waiting game

Alex is stable and moving in the right direction.  Her vent settings are improving and they are keeping her comfortable for the most part. She was pretty "snowed" last night and her blood pressures low so they backed off a bit on her pain med which made her more active and feisty earlier this morning.  She has a ton of secretions and she is coughing a lot so gets really agitated when they suction and mess with her. Although hard to see as a parent it's a good sign to be active, moving around and breathing more and more on her own. She will need to be weaned from the pain meds and sedation eventually to be extubated but until then it's a juggling act to manage her pain.  When she is agitated I'm reminded that she is also getting an amnesia med so she won't remember any of this.  This does make me feel better (in a weird way). 

We are still in a bit of shock that Alex's condition escalated to this level.  We knew she was getting sick and figured she'd be a direct admit from her PCP visit.  Instead we were transferred to the emergency department for the day and then finally to the floor Monday evening. Her condition went downhill shortly after we settled in and within a couple of hours they were calling a RRT (rapid response team) to evaluate her deteriorating condition.  Everything happened so fast from that point on and she was rushed to the PICU.  Despite their best efforts to stabilize her with less invasive measures she ended up needing to be intubated.  It wasn't until early afternoon yesterday that things settled down and her labs were looking much better.     

We are finally getting some of the tests and cultures back and miss Alex tested positive for RSV.  Unfortunately this is not foreign to us and Alex kicked off respiratory season in the PICU a couple years ago with RSV.  Because it's viral we basically have to wait for it to run its course.  The ventilator is allowing Alex's little body to rest and heal as it does most of the breathing work for her.  She is looking as good as could be expected so we are happy with that.  We pray that God continues to have His healing hand on her and that she makes a speedy recovery.