Mom's Intuition

Today I did exactly what Dad told me not to do yesterday.  Only I didn't realize it until about 12 hours after the fact.  As we worked through the emotional ups and downs of the weekend, Dad wisely pointed out that perhaps I was getting too involved in the babies' care, in the sense that I needed to let go and trust the doctors to make the best medical decisions.  As the doctors often point out, some of medicine is a science and some an art, so they will at times make decisions that do not turn out exactly as we hoped, such as taking Lucas off his cannula or Olivia off her cpap.  But there's no way to know without trying, and we learn from those experiences.

During rounds this morning, the art of medicine was on display.  After reviewing Lucas's vitals and his results from his blood gases, the doctors turned to the question of whether or not to start weaning him from the cannula again.  At first, they were preparing to start the process tomorrow, but then the attending stepped back and looking at the big picture, decided to leave him on the extra breathing support for now so that we could focus on increasing his p.o. feeds.  Last week, we tried doing both at once, and it was too much.  I'm a big fan of the decision to work on the eating and let him keep getting stronger before weaning off the cannula again.  No science formula that can be punched into a calculator or charted on a computer to make this decision, just the art of medical care.

Not having the extra effort of weaning from the cannula also means that Lucas gets to start physical therapy this week.  This morning, he had his preliminary assessment.  Most of the assessment was testing his strength, flexibility and alertness, and teaching Mom about how and when to soothe him.  The therapist was really wonderful - some of the staff truly seem to love the babies, and she definitely falls in that category.  She was extremely gentle with him and kept telling Mom how cute he was - and who could argue with her?  The tongue-wagging he gets from his Mom :)

 

The therapist was pleased with how Lucas is doing and will continue to work with him 2-3 times a week.  Hopefully Olivia will get to start her therapy soon too.

So back to the moment when Mom broke the rules.  Since the attending doctors switched today, the babies both got a full review not just of 24 hour events but how things have been going over the past week or two.  The doctors talked about Olivia's adventures with cpap, and the attending's hope to try and take her off again at the end of this week (hooray!)  They also talked about her blood count - her hematocrit and her retic.  Now, I must admit that I don't really know what a retic is, other than I think it has something to do with bone marrow and red blood cell production - any doctors or med students out there reading the blog, feel free to correct me.  But I do know enough to tell when the doctors think a certain count is too low or high.  So as they were wrapping up with Olivia's review I asked if they were going to put her on epogen, which is the Lance Armstrong drug that Lucas got to stimulate his red blood cell production.  The fellow turned to the attending, who had briefly left to check on another patient and said "Mom wants to know if Olivia will go on epogen."  The attending turned right back and asked for her opinion.  "Yes, I think she should start a course."  Oops, there goes Mom, inserting herself into medical decisions.  Well, sometimes it's art, not just science, so maybe Mom's intuition - or just paying close attention during rounds - can be considered a creative force today.