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My Fd has her heart surgery scheduled for the middle of April. But 2 weeks ago, she came down with pneumonia and was hospitalized for 4 days. During that time they found out her blood oxygen levels are alot lower than they should be, even with her heart defect. So now she is on oxygen 24/7, as well as lasix to make sure there is no fluid build up, potassuim solution because the lasix can cause potassium depletion (I guess this is bad), albuteral (breathing treatments) and respiratory therapy. All of this because of a little bit of pneumonia. Its been an interesting couple of weeks. But we got home from the hospital and she started sleeping through the night consistantly (9 or 10 pm til 8 or 9 am), as well as eating more. She ended up loosing weight when she was sick (dropped from 10 pounds, 13 oz to 9 pounds 13 ounces within a month), but put it back on in the week since she's been out of the hospital. But still, there is something severly wrong with a 5 1/2 month old who only weighs 10p13oz. But just as long as she keeps putting on weight before the surgery, I'm not going to worry too much. I understand that it is hard for her to gain weight with this heart condition, so I try to use that as my reason not to worry (but I'm a big worrier, so its hard).
Well thanks for listening. Any help anyone has with the AV Canal defect surgery would be very useful. Thanks.
AmyGarner
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I will be keeping you and your fd in my thoughts during the coming weeks. I hope she does better and better and the surgery is sucessful!
By the way--I weighted 14 ponds on my first birthday and on my 9th bithday I dressed in size 6X! I didn't weigh 100 pounds until I was 20 and 7 mos pregnant with my son!!! She may just be tiny and often these kinds of health problems do delay weight gain--as long as she is eating and getting better try not to worry about the other things--it is so easy to be overcome with worry about everything......
Please keep us posted and I am glad to hear she is responding to these medications and improving.
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i used to work in a children's hospital, explaining med procedures to kids. i worked on an oncology unit, so i did not have much exposure to heart surgery. i just e-mailed my friend who worked with that pt. population. she explained the basics. if you want me to post them here or send you a pm, just let me know.