Fontan Surgery Update: Day 1

Update #6 8:30pm:

She's doing remarkable. I'm completely amazed and crossing my fingers with her recovery so far. She's in and out of sleep, cries out a silent, whimpering cry here and there, opens her eyes for brief moments with tears, and her first whispers to us were "I am hurting"...she's been great at communicating. When we first got in here to see her, we were talking to her and rubbing her head and I said, "Maddie you are such a big girl, we're so proud of you" and she nodded her head. Brought us both to tears. From the medical standpoint, she's on drips of: Milrinone (for helping her heart squeeze & dilates vessels), Dopamine (blood pressure med and was just turned off!), Morphine (a drip for pain as well as a few boluses throughout today when she's told us she's in pain), maintenance fluid, platelets (her blood needs some help after draining through chest tubes and from surgery trauma), ffp (fresh frozen platelets to help clot), as well as calcium chloride (helps with her blood too, replenishing what she's lost). She has three IV's- IJ in her jugular, atrial in her left wrist (which is sad because she sucks her left thumb and it's boarded up) and another IV in her right arm. There are three drain tubes, the central one is good sized but the left and right sided ones are smaller and pliable, since these are the tubes usually left in for drainage for a while. Her drainage is good, she's drained an average amount but the color is starting to change from bloody to a clearer color which is a good sign. Dr. McMullan was very pleased with how her surgery went. She was on the heart/lung by-pass machine for a total of 88 minutes and cross-clamped (her heart was completely stopped and she was cooled to a hypothermic state) for 14 minutes so that was great. He was able to put in an 18mm conduit (which is like the size of my pointer finger) and she has a fenestrated Fontan so her sats may stay in the upper 80's-low 90's. As I'm typing this, she's satting 84% on 2 liters of O2 from a nasal cannula. HR is 104 and blood pressure is 88/54. Throughout the afternoon, she's had a few "sponge sticks" of water and we tried a popcicle but she only licked it a couple of times and was shot. She's just really wiped out but we're so glad she's resting and not fighting this. Knock on wood.

McMullan said that when he began to clear everything out of the way of where he needed to get to on her heart, the AVM collaterals she has looked like Medusa, which made us laugh a little. He even added, "No really, her heart looks like it's sporting dreadlocks." Crazy to think that her little heart has tried so hard at creating a solution to her low oxygen levels and getting blood to her body in other routes. It didn't really like the Glenn flow. These vessels are pesky (she has some coils in some already) and he did have to remove/ligate some of them in order to operate. We're hoping that with her new circulation and blood flow, they will quit developing. Having higher sats after this surgery should help too. He did mention that her pulmonary artery is still narrowed and he tried to attach the gortex shunt in this narrowing area to promote more blood flow and growth to the artery. But overall, he was very pleased and she tolerated everything really well. She had a time bringing her blood pressure up but not anything too alarming. She also ran a little fever post-op but that has resolved itself so far. Her numbers look really good and we couldn't be happier. We're so thankful for the outcome so far and know in our hearts that the many prayers said in her behalf must have something to do with this. Thank you for all of your love, faith and support!

Update #5 4:05: We've been at Maddie's bedside for a couple of hours now. She did really well & came out of the OR extubated! Now just sleeping with times of waking up- will update more in a bit. I'm needed a lot by her now.
Update #4 12:25: she's off by-pass & doing well. Waiting to meet w/ Dr. McMullan, her surgeon.
Update #3 11:20: We never were paged but got antsy and went to ask the ICU desk if they had any updates for us. She was put on by-pass at 11:00 and surgery was going well. Still a few more hours to go but we're about half way through. Passing time with everyone here is great, lots of fun conversation.


Update #2 9:00: We were paged that they were starting the surgery and she was doing great. Waiting for another update. We have lots of family here (Grandpa & Grandma Allred, Ba & Nany, Uncle Mike, Aunt Lesa, cousins Savanna & Braydon, Uncle Ryan & Aunt Jessica, Trent and Susie (Teagie's mom and dad!) and our Pastor, Eric Frey came up too.
Update #1: We got up bright and early, had Maddie here at 6:00am and went back with her to the "zones" at 6:45. She was sleepy still and happy to get a stuffed animal Seahawk dog at admission. Versed worked well and they allowed me to walk her back at 7:30am and be with her while they put her under with the scented strawberry gas. The OR was amazing... so was our girl.