Baby Maverick

Mav continues to swell. His BUN is still about the same. The nephrologist wanted to start him on a renal dose of dopamine, so they started it earlier today. Looking back over his labs, he's been this elevated before and it took anywhere from 2 to 10 days for it to come down. He's always been on diuretics, though, so I don't know how this will work out. He had a heart echo today. Dr. M said they just need to look at everything and see what else may be the cause of the continued swelling. The heart echo showed there is a narrowing of his pulmonary artery. They weren't able to tell if it was at the valve area, around the place where he re-attached the coronaries, or at the spot where the switch was performed. They've decided to perform a heart cath tomorrow at 2:00 to tell exactly where the obstruction is. The problem with the cath is that the dye they use can be toxic to the kidneys, but they need to do it. We're praying that the problem is at the area of the switch, because it is easiest to fix. If the interventional cardiologist is able, he can attempt to balloon the area. If he can't, Dr. M will have to go back in through his sternum and fix that area with a patch to make it larger (another open heart surgery). If it's at the area around where the coronaries were reattached, we're in for something much more complicated. For all my non-medical friends and family, it's kind of like plumbing. If you have a pipe that's too small to handle the flow in your bathroom or kitchen, the water/sewage/etc. will back up. Mav's pipe in his heart is too small in one spot, so the blood backs up and leaks into his tissues instead of going through his heart in a normal fashion. This may be the cause of the swelling. They're not sure, but they're looking at everything because something has to be causing this. They're just trying everything they can think of. It's been a very emotional day, and I know tomorrow will be even more difficult. I'm not going back home at least until Saturday, but that still depends on how Mav is doing. Greg is coming back tonight - we'll be here together tomorrow for the procedure. This is just so scary. Please pray that the problem will be evident and easy to fix and that he'll tolerate tomorrow without any problems. He's been through so much already, I just can't imagine going through another major surgery. Thanks to everyone that's helping with the kids. We appreciate it. Love you all - jc