Day 4: Henry is Steady- Noon update

This morning we met with Henry's doctor and nurses and it looks like he is holding steady. His condition hasn't worsened, which at this point is what we are striving for. The good news is his pulmonary hypertension seems to be improving a bit. He has been taken off one of his blood pressure medicines completely (Dobutamine) and is now on a low dose of the 2nd one- Dopamine.

He is also more responsive and moving more this morning. He is still very sedated- which is what they want so his body doesn't try to do any work, but he squeezed Becki's hand this morning.

He is now on Lipids (fats) and TPN (Yellow Bag of nutrients) to give him some nutrition in his veins in addition to the sugar water.

In 36 hours to 48 hours they hope for him to hold steady and very gradually see less and less support.

Our nurse said something that was encouraging. "As sick as he was, he is now not as sick as he was." This statement sounds odd, but at this point is encouraging. A tiny bit of optimism, which they are always hesitant to give.

The pulmonary hypertension seems to be under control as the pre and post oxygen saturation are steady. They are taking x-ray's every 12 hours and they are looking consistently better. The chest tube is still bubbling so there is still some sort of hole in the lung but they are not overly concerned with it. It will take time to heal.

The 24 hour blood culture has come back negative so there is no sign of infection as of now. They are growing cultures for 3 days so hopefully tomorrow's will be negative as well. They are keeping him on antibiotics just in case.

This a slide I put together to help explain the oscillator breathing machine. There are basically two dials to control his breathing.

1) Amplitude (Volume) of the breaths

2) Frequency (How fast his little chest wiggles).

Yesterday it was tricky to find the right combination of the two variables, but it looks like we have found the right combination. His current breath frequency is set at an amazing 360 breaths per minute. This keeps his lungs consistently open and giving short, tiny breaths.

This is a picture of the machine that controls and holds the oxygen and nitric oxide. The levels are slowly, slowly coming down about every two hours. This morning they were giving him 80% oxygen.

We will update more later as the day progresses.

Ever since we started this blog and got his story out there, we have received an overwhelming response of support and prayer for Henry. We don't think it's a coincidence that his condition has stabilized and not worsened since then. The power of prayer is incredible, and we appreciate all of you praying for our little guy.

We have found how easy it is to see past the tubes and needles now and really look at our baby. He truly is beautiful. He has long fingers and long toes, a lot of long, dark hair, and the cutest little nose. We are so proud of him.