Back at St. Lukes, Boise

Jereth went through two tests and got tubes put in his ears today. He's in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at St. Luke's Boise at least until he has all of the anesthesia out of his system and is considered stable enough to return home - possibly longer.

We got up early this morning in order to have Jereth here by 7:30 am in preparation for a 9:45 am procedure. Once we got checked in we were told that although the gastroenterologist told us we didn't have to stop Jereth's feed until about 3 hours before we were ready to leave the procedure, the anesthesiologist would not touch him until it had been 6 hours since he had something by mouth. So even though we were positive there was nothing in Jereth's stomach (and could have checked using his feeding tube) we had to sit for over 2 hours and wait.

Finally it had been 6 hours and Dr. Thompson and Dr. Beck visited with us a little, then they took Jereth to the operating room for Dr. Thompson to have a look at his esophagus, stomach, and intestines and for Dr. Beck to look at his airway and put tubes in his ears. He was also supposed to have a sedated echocardiogram in the recovery room, but he was not sedated enough and would not settle down, so the echocardiogram did not happen.

Dr. Thompson said that Jereth's gastrointestinal tract looks fine as far as the pieces and parts go - they are all in the right place and look normal. He took small pieces from each area to be looked at under a microscope. We should have the results of that part of the test late Wednesday or on Thursday.

Dr. Beck showed us pictures of Jereth's windpipe. She said it looks normal and she did not see any signs of tracheomalacia (floppy lower airway) even though she looked at the trachea for quite a while to see if there was any collapsing. Apparently something - or a combination of things - has helped strengthen his airway since the bronchioscope in Utah. She said the windpipe should no longer be an excuse to wait to have his heart repaired. She also said that doctors frequently postpone heart surgery due to ear infections and they won't be able to use that excuse either now that he has tubes in his ears.

We haven't heard from Dr. Walker since getting to the PICU, but since the echocardiogram didn't take place she may not have had anything new to tell us. Dr. Beck said she was going to call Dr. Walker and I expect Dr. Thompson did, too. Maybe we will hear from her tomorrow.

Although Dr. Beck sent us to the PICU to monitor Jereth's recovery from the procedures it sounds like the doctor here may choose to keep him here for several days while they try to wean him off the high flow air as much as possible and determine exactly what amount of airway support he needs now so that information can be sent to Salt Lake in preparation for the heart surgery.