March 16, 2007

"Worship the LORD your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you." Exodus 23:25

Just a quick note to let you know that Kyle's surgery was completed at about 9:00 this morning and in the surgeons words, "everything went perfect." Praise God!!!

The surgeon went in Kyle's back to access his heart, the incision begins below his neck and wraps down ending under Kyle's left armpit. For the most part, they were able to use a surgical glue, along with a couple stitches, to close the wound. The surgeon was able to pull two ribs apart to get where he needed, apparently babies bones are much more flexible than adults. I was surprised by how large his incision looks. I knew the incision would be about two inches long, which I thought was pretty small. What I hadn't realized was just how big two inches looks when the person is only 12 inches to begin with! The doctors say it should heal very nicely and that the scarring should be minimal, babies skin tends to scar less than ours. If Kyle is anything like Daddy, his scar will not be visible under all the hair anyways! Ha-ha! :)

The ductus was closed with a metal clamp that will remain in Kyle permanently. As the clamp is metal, the surgeon informed us that Kyle will set off metal detectors in airports. I can't wait for the day that I can take him to an airport, or anywhere for that matter! He also mentioned that Kyle will not be able to have MRI's done, which I did not realize stands for "Magnetic Resonance Imaging". Apparently the magnetic forces of the MRI can move the metal clamp in Kyle and lead to serious trauma.

A tube was placed in Kyle's chest to help with drainage from the surgery and it will be removed in a few days. Around 11:00 AM Kyle was having an episode of desaturation (desat) which means there is too little oxygen in the bloodstream. They did a chest XRAY to confirm that everything was okay with the placement of the tube as well as to confirm the ductus was closed and both were okay. Kyle was in effect "paralyzed" for the surgery and they believe the desat was caused by this. They were able to treat it with increased oxygen and he is doing much better now.

Kyle began to wake up around noon at which time more pain medication was administered. Since Kyle obviously can't tell us when he is in pain, the nurses watch for several signs of discomfort. The most obvious, to me anyways, is that he wrinkles his forehead or grimaces as if he is in pain. They also monitor how many breaths per minutes (bpm) he is taking. The ventilator is set to give Kyle 30 bpm, however, Kyle usually takes around 50 bpm - any amount over the 30 are done on his own. As he was waking up, the bpm's he was taking on his own were decreasing. Much like you or I, if our chest was in pain it is not instinct to increase our breathing and/or to take deep breaths. The last sign they look for is an increased heart rate.

When the surgeon went over the risks of the surgery this morning, there were many, however, once Kyle made it through the surgery there are only two we really need to look out for. First, there is a risk that the ductus can re-open in the next couple of months. Second, there is a nerve, the size of a strand of hair, for Kyle's vocal cords in very close proximity to the ductus that could be damaged during surgery. We won't know for a couple weeks if this nerve was damaged or not. Chance of complications with this type of surgery occurring is only about 1%, so we are hopeful Kyle will be just fine.

God says, "My angels will always protect you" (Psalm 34:7) and you all have certainly been Kyle's angels throughout this whole experience. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Much Love,

Jennifer, Joe, Madison and Kyle