Too Much News

We haven't been able to see Hunter since last Friday morning. Over the last few days everybody has been getting the flu, one at a time. So now we aren't allowed back in the NICU until Thursday. That's going to be nearly a week without seeing Hunter.

We have been in contact with his nurses though, so at least we're able to keep up to date on how he's doing. A few hours after we left on Friday they did take him off of CPAP and we're hoping that he is done with it forever. He also had his first bottle that same day. He did very well with the bottle, he took half of his meal through the bottle and had to have the rest of it down the tube.

When he came off of CPAP they had him at a high pressure. Usually they try to wean the pressure down before they take babies off of CPAP. Hunter had some trouble adjusting to the lower pressure of being on only oxygen. Doctor said that his oxygen requirements were still fluctuating too much. To help him adjust to the pressure change they doubled the pressure of his oxygen, but it's not healthy to do that for too long so they only did that for 24 hours.

Now they're trying something completely different, they are keeping his oxygen flow at 100% and they are going to try to wean the pressure down to a point where they can hopefully take it off. In the case that they can't take it off at least they'll be able to send him home with oxygen and an idea of how much his body requires. As of last night they are a little concerned because the oxygen in his body is still dropping at times and that should not be happening when he's receiving full oxygen.

Doctor ordered an x-ray of his chest and they found that his lungs are still cloudy. That means there is still some extra fluid in there that is probably making it harder for him to breathe efficiently. I think they're going to give him a medication for that but in case it doesn't help they do have some other ideas.