Dear Tattered Angel,
Our lives have become filled with doctor visits, hospital stays and surgeries followed with casts and a harness between the treatments for you and your little sister. This past week we took the family to attend a bimonthly followup visit for the newborn to see if her hips are progressing after two weeks of only having to wear her harness at night after nearly a month of never taking it off. Loading all four children into our Yukon, we made the quick journey to see our family pediatric orthopedic surgeon for our scheduled afternoon clinic visit. Over the course of your treatment we have joined a research study for a group of doctors who are trying to isolate the DNA strands that may help identify high risk cases at birth based on genetics. With our last hospital stay as we waited for news of your progress, we filled our time with blood samples and xrays of our hips to see if we had any signs of hip dysplasia. With the surgery complete, the surgeon reviewed our xrays and reported, "Perfect hips for both of you." Now while at the clinic, we invited each of your siblings to join the study. With the consent of both, the nurses drew blood and took xrays. A very nervous surgeon entered the room after reviewing the xrays to inform us both your older siblings are free and clear. Our surgeon with relief educated us how difficult it was for her to see the xrays. Her fear of additional children with this defect was weighing heavy on her mind as she contemplated how she would inform parents already struggling with treatment of two children of a third or fourth. With perfect xrays we had a small celebration before reviewing the results of your sister's Ultrasound. Already aware of the first interpretation of the black and white image, we braced ourselves for what our next steps would be. With a serious tone, our surgeon informed us our little newborn must return to the harness 24 hours a day for another two weeks to address concerns the hip socket had lost a little ground on the depth of the socket resulting in low coverage of the femur head. Checking the harness to make adjustments, she offered words of encouragement of the images from the last measurements were not to different, but wanted to be sure of continued progress of the developing hips. With our course set for the next two weeks, we thanked all involved in our treatment, loaded into the SUV and headed home to await the results of another ultrasound in two weeks.
Our lives have become filled with doctor visits, hospital stays and surgeries followed with casts and a harness between the treatments for you and your little sister. This past week we took the family to attend a bimonthly followup visit for the newborn to see if her hips are progressing after two weeks of only having to wear her harness at night after nearly a month of never taking it off. Loading all four children into our Yukon, we made the quick journey to see our family pediatric orthopedic surgeon for our scheduled afternoon clinic visit. Over the course of your treatment we have joined a research study for a group of doctors who are trying to isolate the DNA strands that may help identify high risk cases at birth based on genetics. With our last hospital stay as we waited for news of your progress, we filled our time with blood samples and xrays of our hips to see if we had any signs of hip dysplasia. With the surgery complete, the surgeon reviewed our xrays and reported, "Perfect hips for both of you." Now while at the clinic, we invited each of your siblings to join the study. With the consent of both, the nurses drew blood and took xrays. A very nervous surgeon entered the room after reviewing the xrays to inform us both your older siblings are free and clear. Our surgeon with relief educated us how difficult it was for her to see the xrays. Her fear of additional children with this defect was weighing heavy on her mind as she contemplated how she would inform parents already struggling with treatment of two children of a third or fourth. With perfect xrays we had a small celebration before reviewing the results of your sister's Ultrasound. Already aware of the first interpretation of the black and white image, we braced ourselves for what our next steps would be. With a serious tone, our surgeon informed us our little newborn must return to the harness 24 hours a day for another two weeks to address concerns the hip socket had lost a little ground on the depth of the socket resulting in low coverage of the femur head. Checking the harness to make adjustments, she offered words of encouragement of the images from the last measurements were not to different, but wanted to be sure of continued progress of the developing hips. With our course set for the next two weeks, we thanked all involved in our treatment, loaded into the SUV and headed home to await the results of another ultrasound in two weeks.
1 comment:
thank you for your blog! ! could you give me your info again? I left a comment awhile back and you sent me your number if I ever had any questions and I CANNOT find that email (or where it was you sent the info)- We are in UT too and just saw a dr at Shriner's and loved her. I'd love any advice. I'm sorry about your newborn baby. your blog is so ispirational--thank you for sharing. my email is LBMarie9@Hotmail.com--laura
Post a Comment