Monday May 19, 2008

The girls have really taken on their own personalities today. Evie is focusing her efforts on gaining weight and Maggie is focusing on her lungs. Evie looks huge today! I had noticed she was getting bigger, but she was laying on her back today and I could see that she was really chunking up. Her arms and legs are meatier and her face is bigger. She is a little puffy too, but still! Evie did have to get a new ET (endotracheal) “breathing” tube today because her old one was leaking – or the air was leaking around it. So, she got a new face bar and a bigger ET tube. So, we’ll see if that helps her lungs out, as they still need some attention. They upped her pressures a bit to see if we can get those lungs expanded. Great news though, the echocardiogram showed that Evie’s ductus was closed!! And unless she has issues with blood pressure or other evidence of ductus issues, they don’t intent on doing more echocardiograms. Evie also increased her feedings to 2.2 cc every 3 hours. Tonight Evie also moved to a bigger diaper…the old one still fit – but not when it was full! (Evie and her big diaper)

Maggie is still doing awesome with her breathing needs. She was down in the 20%’s most of the day and 21% (room air) tonight. Her feedings went up to 5.2cc every 3 hours. The neat thing about the feedings is that they replace the TPN (total parenteral nutrition) – i.e. the IV nutrients. So, when they get to full feedings (7-8cc), they can get rid of 2 IV tubes. However, they usually keep the pic line open and give small amounts of saline just in case they need the line. Maggie is also having appropriate bowel movements. I saw her diaper this morning and it was disgusting, I wasn’t quite prepared for that. Of course, Joe thought it was awesome, so he is going to be in charge of poopy diapers from here on. I think the night nurses are also keeping one for him – eww gross. (Maggie sleeping soundly)

Maggie’s echocardiogram showed that her ductus was still moderate sized. However, because it does not seem to be impacting her lung development or causing other problems now, we will just let it be. Maggie also got kanga care with Mom today. She was really good, until we put her back in her room – then she didn’t think she should breathe on her own, but eventually she settled down and was fine. Since Evie had such an eventful afternoon, we decided she would be better off resting in her room.