(She is doing great and home now)
Friday evening Jeff noticed she was wheezing. After looking it up on the internet and calling her doctor we decided she need to go to the Mary Bridges Children's Hospital ER.
Jean (Jeff's Mom) sped over to our house and drove Gwen and I to the ER
(Jeff stayed home with Max).
Once at the hospital we were immediately taken back to a room and after much checking of her vitals Dr. Hurt (name makes me laugh a little) told us she had Bronchilitus.
Basically when an infant gets a bad cold it can inflame and make mucus build up in the lung tissues the Bronchili (similar to what Bronchitis does to the bronchial tubes)
It usually runs 10 to 14 days total
For the first 2-3 it seems like a normal cold (no big deal)
For the next 3-4 is miserable and usually includes wheezing and difficulty breathing
From then on she is out of the woods although still ill.
They decided to do an asthma treatment which sometimes helps
Her is Gwen with the breathing mask on, it was actually rather cute with the dragon face and the treatment made it breath smoke. Although this did help a little it a was not as successful as they hoped.
After on and off blow by oxygen (holding it near her face but not masking it over her face) the doctor, Jean and I talked it over and decided she was obviously not well but could go home. She was cheerful and her oxygen saturation was good at 95% and up. She is what is called a happy wheezer. I agreed to go to our doctor the next morning and we went home.
Although she went right to sleep she woke up often during the night. After she nursed badly and refused to eat her yogart and applesauce (she also looked like a limp noodle) I was sure she was worse and called for a morning appt as soon as the doctor opened.
Sonja (who was planning to play with us that day) came over early so Max did not have to come to the doctor appt (turned out to be a good thing he did not come). I had a feeling they might send us back to the ER so I backed some provisions and lots of knitting.
As soon as we were seen at the doctor the RN told me they were concered about how fast she was breathing etc and want to do blow by oxygen and were sending us to Mary Bridge by ambulance (they were shocked the ER had sent us home the night before)
(Gwen stats at this point: Blood/Oxy saturation 85 and 70 breaths a min, should be 30-50 breaths a min)
(Cute picture of Gwen and Max here as I know there is lots of text in this post)
Everyone was extremely nice and calm. I think there were 6 people all hovering in our exam room exchanging information once the ambulance crew came. I am sure one large man was supposed to be distracting me and blocking all the hub-ub. They packed us off into the ambulance (Gwen on oxygen the whole time) and we were off to the hospital (no sirens and lights) I cannot convey how sweet everyone was to both of us and they were especially careful to talk to Gwen in cute and calm voices.The bonus of coming to the hospital in an ambulance (besides not having to park the car) is you don't have to sit in the waiting room. We went right back to a room where they began monitoring her vitals and put her on oxygen through a nose tube.
After some doctor/me consultation they tried the treatment from last night; it did not change anything. At this point they officially admitted her (about 12 noon Saturday)
Gwen and I were escorted to our room on the 7th floor where we met our nurse and doctor. (Gwen in her crib and a view of all the computers in the room)
The doctor basically agreed with the ER doctors that she had Bronchilitus and need oxygen and treatments to help loosen the mucus in her lungs.From then on every four hours she had a 3% saline solution vaporized over her nose and mouth (with the dragon face mask) This help her cough more efficiently and break up the mucus.
She slept well after this as it was much easier to breath.
After she had a napped she was more cheerful and smiley (so nice to see).
Jeff came after work and was great moral support (he also brought Taco Bell!)
About 9pm they tried turning off the oxygen and she could hold her oxygen saturation about 90 (step 1 to going home). She coughed a lot (a good thing) and slept fairly well (who could ask for more?)
In the morning the doctor agreed we could go home as the saline treatments had done their business and she did not need oxygen. Gwen was over the worst part and there was nothing else to do but wait out the rest of the disease.
Jean and Max picked us up at 10:30am!
Gwen is doing great now she is cheerful and eating anything I spoon to her. We have a humidifier running in her room but other then that there is nothing else we can do. It really was just a cold that stuck in her lungs.
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