A Taste of the Good Life

For a while today, Lewis had a semi-private room off in the corner of the NICU, to keep things a little quieter for him. It was pretty nice. Jenn and Lewis got to enjoy the quiet most of the day. Unfortunately, the NICU had a couple of new admissions this evening. Now they need to use that space to separate some contagious babies, so Lewis is back in the bed where he started. He's still awfully fussy, but he had a good day.

Surgery - at lunchtime, we met with the Surgeon who is scheduled to perform the Nissen Fundoplication and install the g-tube for Lewis. The Nissen solves reflux problems, the g-tube is just a more permanent way to feed him, instead of the nasogastric tube he uses now. Right now, surgery is planned for 9:30AM on Friday. The Surgeon told us a lot of stuff, including:

• the Barium survey ( scheduled for tomorrow) actually won't tell us anything about Lewis' reflux, but will tell the surgeon whether the layout of Lewis' intestines is unusual in any way. They are already convinced that Lewis' reflux is severe enough to need the Nissen surgery
• the surgery usually takes about 3 or 4 hours. It is almost always laproscopic (done through a few very small incisions).
• the outcome of the Nissen fundoplication isn't a 100% success rate, he put it at 80 to 90% for kids with some neurological issues. The surgeon also went through odds on a number of other side effects/potential complications. Suffice it to say that this usually works, and there aren't a lot of better options. If that doesn't give you a warm fuzzy, note that almost all the complications are either tolerable (i.e. 50% chance you won't be able burp or vomit afterwards) or fixable afterwards with minor procedures.

Feeding - Lewis gained a couple of ounces overnight, trending in the right direction.

Respiratory - doing well. Lewis only had to be suctioned twice during the whole overnight shift last night. Can't tell whether he just had fewer secretions or is handling them better or both. He'll have to be intubated (put on a ventilator) for a day or two for the surgery, but hopefully he'll get back to where he is quickly.

Even Jenn only had limited success keeping Lewis calm today. We're told that some of this fussiness may be helped with the surgery, which should make him more comfortable. When I visited after work, the nurses let me try a pacifier with just a bit of milk on it. Lewis took it really well - he sucked on it twice for about 20-30 seconds each time. He also latched on to my finger a couple of times for longer than he had done before. This was real progress - hopefully we'll be able to hang on to it after his surgery. Between the pacifier and lots of singing songs and changing positions, he probably only cried for half the time I visited :)