- When you are rushing her to the ER at 3:30 AM;
- When they immediately get her to a room because her O2 sat is only 88%;
- When they are shoving tubes in her nose to deliver oxygen to her;
- When her blood is all over you from repeated attempts to start an IV;
- When the ER doctor says she is being admitted to the hospital;
- When the nurses call in a specialist for an assessment and he decides to admit her to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) for more intensive and closely supervised care;
- When you are watching her tiny chest struggling to rise and fall and thinking that the next breath might be her last.
In the wee hours of Sunday, February 12th, the
Hubs and I made the decision to take Isabella to the ER because she had been
struggling to breathe for several hours and “the fish” was no longer helping
her. She would pant and gasp and wheeze
and her chest and stomach would sink and heave with each and every breath. After arriving at the ER and discovering that
her oxygen saturation was only 88%, she was immediately taken to a room where
she was poked and prodded, given oxygen, taken for a chest x-ray, and, given an
IV (or so we sort of thought). Shortly
thereafter the ER doc told us that her chest x-ray resembled RSV and bacterial
pneumonia and her white blood cell count was sky high and so he was admitting
her to the pediatric floor of the hospital.
Upon our arrival on the pediatric floor, the nurses discovered that
Isabella’s IV was not functional and so it had to be pulled and started again,
this time in her foot. It wasn’t long
before the nurses noticed her heart rate continuing to stay high, despite her
being semi-asleep, because she was fighting so hard to breathe. They decided to call in the Pediatric
Pulmonologist, an" Intensivist", who reviewed her chart and x-rays
and determined that she did not actually have pneumonia but rather inflammation
in her lungs, “air trapping”, and likely a “reactive airway disease” i.e.
asthma. He recommended a relatively new
treatment known as “heliox” where helium is combined with oxygen and mixed with
albuterol to help open the airways. This
treatment would be a continuous flow for 4 hours and would need to be performed
in the PICU. Of course we gave our
consent and we were whisked away and set up in a PICU room. It was a heartwrenching thing to see my
little sweet baby attached to so many wires and tubes, but still trying to
smile. She was so brave, so tough, so
strong.
After one heliox treatment, it seemed things were
improving. Her lungs sounded more
functional and she began to “perk” a bit. About an hour later, however, she became
very irritable and started pulling at the wires and tubes, thrashing, arching her back, and refusing a paci or bottle . The respiratory
therapist and nurse, upon listening to her lungs again, determined that she was
likely having a bronchospasm, and so another 4 hour heliox treatment was
started. I was anxious and scared,
wondering if my baby would ever be free from the tubes and wires helping her to
breathe. Still, she was so brave and
strong, and soon she began to relax again; enough to be able to get a little
sleep.
Long story short, the second heliox treatment did its job
and Isabella’s lungs continued to move air well with a little help from nebulizer treatments every
2, then 3, then 4 hours. Steroids,
antibiotics, and fluids were being pumped in her tiny body via IV. “Maintenance meds” typically used to
prevent/treat asthma were being administered by inhaler. I began to relax as she began to be more like herself. I no longer feared she would die. The nurses and respiratory therapists were
amazing and I credit them – as well as my baby’s strength and courage – for saving
her life!
We were discharged a few days later with prescriptions for prednisone (oh joy!), FloVent (the asthma maintenance med), Singluair (another asthma and allergy maintenance med), and albuterol for the nebulizer. It hurts me to see such a tiny baby, not even a year old, on so many meds, especially the ones that scare her so to administer…………but then it is far better than seeing her struggle, hooked to all of the machines, fearing for her life.
It actually hurts to write about this, the emotion and fear still so close at hand.
I can feel tears pricking the back of my eyes. I was doing a load of her laundry the other day and came across the
little footie pajamas that she was wearing when we rushed her to the ER. It made me sick to my stomach – the flashback,
the emotion, the fear! I’m not sure I’ll
ever be able to put those pajamas on her again.
You really never know your own strength until it is sorely
tested……….but my baby is my hero. She is
amazing and I love her more than words could ever express.
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