A Pretty Good Day

Lynnea had a pretty good day today. Her white blood cell count was lower today than it has been in the past few weeks, which is a sign that maybe she is finally starting to move past this infection. Her temperature was down most of the day (98.4 - 98.9), but she began to spike a fever again this evening. Her temp is now 101.3. Her blood-oxygen saturation levels have been in the low 80's most of the day, and most of the day she has only needed minimal oxygen (25-30%) and at times she did not require any extra oxygen. Her ventilator is still set at a PEEP of 10, with a rate of 12. Dr. St. Louis removed her chest tube earlier today, and he seems to be relatively happy with the progress that she is making.

Her G-tube began to leak heavily again today, and the theory is that she is just not moving her food through her system fast enough because of all of the sedatives that she is on. So, tomorrow sometime she will have her G-tube taken out, and they will put in a GJ-tube instead. A GJ-tube is a longer tube than her G-tube (which goes directly into her stomach), and allows food to go into her small bowel, rather than into her stomach. We, of course, hope that this is only temporary, and that we will be able to return to a regular G-tube before we go home.