The Hopeful Game plan for the Week

Things the last few days with Elias have been very stable. Over the weekend one of his nurses, Trish (one of his favorite by the way), noticed a few things about him, especially after not having seem him in a few days. She talked the doctors into putting him back on the fentanyl drip rather than on an "as needed basis." As she put it, with all the tubes in and out of his body the poor little guy was just not able to get comfortable, and who would with all of that. He really needed something to help take the edge off. Ever since he has been more stable, more awake, more alert, & most important less fussy (which means less discomfort). He is scheduled to have an upper GI sometime this week to test for leaks in his esophagus. If all goes well he will start feeding after that. The real test will be to see if the Chylous fluid begins to build again because of the fat in the breast milk. If so then they will change the diet and continue to drain and let the thoracic duct heal. The sign that he has had very little drainage from the chest tube creates optimism that it has repaired itself, but cannot be 100% until they test with the feeding. If he responds to the feeding without fluid buildup then they will take the chest tube out. Soon after if not before the chest tube comes out they plan to take him off the ventilator and hope he does not have a repeat crash like he did a few weeks ago.

We do have some video and pictures that should be up later tonight after we return from the hospital.