Aubrey's surgery

[Guest guest]

Yesterday, Aubrey had her slipped fundo/hernia repaired. The surgeon found

that it had definitely come undone and slipped up into her diaphragm,

actually ripping it up. He had to repair the diaphragm and re-do the fundo.

Aubrey did fine thru the surgery and is recovering today. The GI doc told us

that it should definitely improve her breathing. So hopefully, her breathing

will improve and reflux will stop which will help with her secretions and

enable us to get the trach out sooner. The ENT also put tubes into her ears

(which both had fluid built up), looked and took pictures of her choanal

atresia repair (which is still patent!), did a bronchoscopy and a

laryngoscopy. She found that her airway had just a slight collapse above the

trach, and her vocal chords were slightly " thicker " than before. However,

she said it all looked really good and there was nothing she found that would

require her to need a trach to breathe. This is all good news, but still

leaves everyone baffled as to why she can't wear the passy-muir valve. Our

ENT wants her to be able to wear it before decannulating. However, I think

she is still too small to get enough air around the trach to come out her

mouth and nose. She has the smallest ped trach in (3.0) to allow air to get

around it. The only thing anyone can really think of causing her to need the

trach now is that she can't manage her secretions good enough. With the

trach in, because of it blocking her airway and because of her secretions,

she can't get enough air around it to come out the mouth/nose. Therefore,

she can't wear the passy-muir. However, the doctor wants her to be able to

wear the passy-muir all day before taking the trach out. We're not really

interested in just waiting it out until she is much older (since she really

has no airway structural problems) - We are going to try and decannulate (in

a hospital setting, of course) probably sometime within the next 6 months or

so.

Bradley

father to Aubrey (9.5 months - ChARgE)