Hospital Trip....Again.

Just wanted to update you all on Miss Emily. We have had an eventful weekend! Friday, she spent the entire beautiful day playing outside. Saturday, she woke up with a very runny, nasty nose and had a nagging cough, but nothing serious. We attributed her fussiness to playing outside and getting exposed to all kinds of pollen (we found out Saturday that the pollen count that day was the highest it has been ALL YEAR!) We basically hung around the house and did our best to soothe/console her. She is also getting her incisor teeth right now so we were not sure if her teeth were hurting, she had a cold, or was battling allergies.

Sunday morning, she woke up extremely sick. She kind of laid around the house, not really playing (totally out of character for her) and around 10am I put her in the shower with me, thinking the steam might help break up the mucous all in her chest and nose. When we got her out of the shower she took a fast turn for the worst-- she was breathing very fast, working hard to breathe, and her heart rate was very high. We tried treating her with her albuterol inhaler but it didn't seem to do the trick, so we packed her up and took her to the ER.

When we got her to the ER she was listless and looked bad, but not horrible. They hooked her up to the pulse oximeter and we discovered her pulse/ox was 77...normal is upper 90s to 100, so 77 is pretty bad, especially for a baby. The triage nurse even said the words, "Has she ever been intubated before?" My heart fell out of my chest and I got super upset but tried to hold it together so she wouldn't get scared. Her heart rate was in the 190s and she was breathing upwards of 60 times per minute- practically panting. We got into a treatment room and they started working on her FAST. She got a dose of steroids, a chest Xray, got another strong treatment of albuterol, and was put on 2L of oxygen. Slowly her stats began to improve. (She did not get intubated this trip, thank you Lord!)

We got admitted because she was oxygen dependent and her stats were not good enough to try to wean her off. It was a very long night. The poor thing was so tired (she had no nap on Saturday OR Sunday!) but she was so sweet and good natured through the whole thing, even when she was scared. One thing that was sort of funny was that she would talk to the doctors, nurses, and respiratory therapists and greet them when they came in the room with a big, "Hello!" but then as soon as they would start working on her she would yell, "Bye bye!" like she was telling them they had overstayed their welcome and should leave. It was hysterical!

I stayed overnight with her and Paul went home and tried to sleep. He ended up coming back to the hospital about 3am because he couldn't sleep with us there. Together we slept on about a 2.5 foot bench/sofa thing in her room...I have slept in many places that were more comfortable! She didn't need any additional albuterol treatments overnight and her stats were looking much better by this morning.

The overall diagnosis is that she has asthma (even though she is still too young for the 'official' diagnosis). Her case was reviewed by a world-renowned pediatric pulmonologist today (he writes textbooks on peds pulmonology) and he said even though they are supposed to be 2 years old (she is 18 months tomorrow!) that this "looks like asthma, reacts like asthma, is exacerbated by allergies like asthma"....so he is calling it asthma. Hopefully the addition of FloVent to her daily routine will help us from having to go to the hospital with this anymore. It is terribly hard to have her in there, caged up like a little animal. Not to mention that she is a very busy girl and does not love the hospital crib one bit! We see her pediatrician on May 10 for her 18 month appt and hopefully we'll be able to discuss the effects of the FloVent on her from now until then.

Anyway, just wanted to clear the air and let everyone know the "rest of the story". She is doing much better now- when we left today her oxygen sat was in the high 90-100 range on room air (she's been off oxygen since about 9am). Thanks for keeping her in your thoughts and being concerned. We are very happy and relieved to have her home with us tonight and feeling so much better.