The Whole Enchilada

Here is Reagan in the ER in her handy dandy hospital gown. This is right when we got there and changed her. She did not like being in the ER. Every time someone new came in the room, they stuck her with some sort of needle. This was the second IV. They put it in her foot because her wrist was too fat! Now she is on the FOURTH IV!! They don't last very long when she pulls them out! Also, the one in her foot came out of the vein right before her surgery and caused her fluids to pool in her leg. That made the surgery take quite a bit longer because they had to get the swelling to go down and start a new IV. More pictures in the ER. So, here is the whole, up to date story. I'll try to do the Reader's Digest version. Ok, starting on late Sunday night, we noticed Reagan having a fever. On Monday it wasn't getting any better and so I took her to the doctor to be looked over. He went through the whole list of normal things that would cause a baby to get fever and she didn't have any of them. AKA, no ear infection, URI, cold, etc. So he sent me home and said that if on Wednesday morning she still had a high fever, to bring her back for more tests. Well, on Wednesday her fever was not high and so I thought she was getting better. Then I went to get her dressed around noon and she cried when I put her pants on. Then I noticed that she didn't really want to crawl or put weight on her left leg. I took the pants off and her knee was swollen and hot to the touch. It was hard to really see the swolleness because her legs are so beefy anyway. So, I took her back to the doctor, he looked at her and said that yes it was an issue and a serious one. I needed to take her to Cook's and see an infectious disease doc and an orthopedic surgeon because they would need to start her on antibiotics and clean out the infection in her knee joint. I meet David at the hospital and we meet with the surgeon. Reagan had xrays, blood work and had her IV put in right away. Then the surgeon, Dr. Vara, said he wanted to aspirate her knee and make sure the swelling was infection (puss) and not clear liquid. The way he made it sound was that puss would be the better of the two options because it would be easier to clean up, but that either way it would be an emergency surgery. So two men held my baby down while Vara stuck a HUGE needle straight down into her knee. She was screaming and I was panicking. It was puss. They then took her straight upstairs to surgery. The surgery was supposed to take 45 min and ended up taking 2 hours and 15 min due to all the IV problems and the fact that Vara wanted to take a sample of her bone marrow from her femur to make sure the infection didn't get into her bone. She did well in surgery and woke up well in recovery. That's where I stayed with her all night and that was really no fun. Lots of people in and out, lots of noise, and no space to move around. On Thursday we got our room and Reagan was started on her pain meds and antibiotics. This was not a very eventful day. On Friday, today, Vara came and checked her bandage, redressed it, and took her drain out. He told us that none of the cultures he sent off (of the puss and bone marrow) had started to grow in the lab yet and since he didn't have a definite yes or no on whether the infection was in her bones, he wanted to do an MRI to confirm it wasn't. This meant they would have to put her all the way back out for the procedure (babies don't know to stay still when you tell them to and it was going to take about 2 hours for the whole study of her bone). We hated her getting more anesthesia and another tube down her throat, but that's what we had to do in order to be safe. The MRI came back clean and no infection in the bone!! YEA!! Now, through this whole thing, every time they would read Reagan's blood pressure it was high. Sometimes they would say it was due to her being upset and crying or maybe being in pain from her knee, but all day on Friday she would be real clam when they would check it and it was still high. So, Vara ordered that she be catheterized and a urine sample be sent off to check for infection in her bladder and kidneys (babies can't pee into a cup on command :). They did that a few hours ago and we still haven't heard results. So far we know they want to keep us for at least 5 days (after surgery) to do IV antibiotics and then they will send us home on some oral meds. They may keep us a little longer and I'm sure they will if they find anything else. Also, there is still a 50% chance they might have to go back in and clean her knee out again if the antibiotics aren't doing enough. Vara said he thinks we are ok and won't need to do that, but he won't know for sure until another few days pass. Please keep praying for a FAST recovery and healing for our little girl. She is tired of being here and really tired of all the poking and prodding they are doing on her. Reagan's surgery leg when the drain was still in. Playing with Yaya in her prison crib. :) Playing with her Easter basket sent over by David's work.