Port removal with hiccups

This morning Alan went down to OR for surgery to remove his port. Miss Sheila from Child Life came to keep him entertained while we waited through all the preliminaries. She had a white "bunny suit" to go over her clothes so she could go all the way into the OR with Alan. Unfortunately Mommy had to say good bye in the hallway.

Holly came to see us in the surgical waiting room about half an hour in to the procedure to tell us that the tubing from the port had adhered to his vein, so surgeon had to make an incision in his collar bone area to be able to get it loose. That meant they couldn't run a CVC there, so they would put a PICC line in his other arm instead. However when they put it in they couldn't get a blood draw, so it came out. They left the old PICC line on the right arm instead of replacing so they don't risk losing access and also put an IV in his right hand. We just can't seem to catch a break, even on something that should be a standard procedure.

Alan bounced back from the procedure pretty quickly, enough that he could work with Lindsay the OT. We also replaced the Fentanyl patches with a single 25 mcg/hr patch this afternoon. Because of the incision in his left arm from the PICC attempt, we have to do BPs on his left leg now, which makes readings for whether the Labetalol is needed difficult. A BP taken on the leg will read higher than one on his arm, but there is no definitive way convert what that reading would have been if taken on his arm so the nurse will have to make a judgement call.


Darci blowing bubbles for Alan while we wait for Transport


Miss Sheila in the bunny suit to go into OR with Alan and the "pink iPad"


The iPad is now the world's most expensive tray