Cruising Altitude – Checkup At Stanford

Today Hana had her regularly scheduled checkup with her heart failure/transplant cardiologist at Lucile Packard (at Stanford). Her weight is up to 7.7 kg (almost 17 lbs) which is 170 grams more than last Tuesday. They were able to get her blood pressure (sometimes, most times, they aren’t able to get it) which was 108/55. They could her an intermittent gallup in her heart. They talked about her creatinine levels. They decided to adjust her Lasix so she is more dehydrated. She is more dehydrated than most normal babies, but too hydrated for a baby with a poor heart. But the overall assessment is that she looks great. They called this her new cruising altitude.

That means that we will watch the weight gain trajectory she is on. They will still be increasing some of her meds until they get to the levels that they want. We will watch the vomiting, since this is a normal occurrence for many tube fed babies, but there seems to be much hope that she will eventually take things by mouth and the tube can go. One vomit a day is not so bad, they say. She recovers well. They said we can all relax a bit more and just focus on enjoying our baby. The cardiologist said he didn’t even want to bring up “the transplant topic” on this visit.

They increased her Lasix from twice to three times a day. They doubled her Carvedilol again. They will wait until next time to increase her Enalapril. They want to do bloodwork again in a week to check how she is doing with the increase in Lasix. We will do another echo at Kaiser in a couple of weeks and we will go back to see them at Stanford in a month.

I am feeling much calmer and relaxed. They even said we could think about making travel plans, including a possible airplane flight. They said to just treat her like a normal baby. I can take her swimming again and they also said to go ahead and take her on the bus! I’ve been avoiding the bus because of small, enclosed spaces with lots of people, but it has kept us confined to walking distance from our house (and we only have one car which Paul takes to work).

I think we are really starting to get into a rhythm. We definitely need less and less help at home, most days. I could still use more sleep. Some of the conveniences that we pay for people offer to us are still making it manageable, but I definitely see a cruising altitude for all of us soon! We are so grateful for all of the support and help that we have received from so many people!