Well, it is 9:10 am. I'm on my 5th cup of coffee. (I think its time to switch to decaf.) We are still waiting for an update from the OR. In the meantime, here are some other random tidbits.
- We met the cardiothoracic surgeon this morning. He's very nice and "well -seasoned". In a case like Shawna's , we really value experience!! Anyway, his wife is still in the hospital, but recovering nicely.
- Dr. M anticipates that her repair will be complete by noon. Hmmm.. We were originally told 3 pm. We'll just wait and see...
- The surgical plan is to repair the defect and orient her vessels into their proper locations. The biggest risk here is damaging the conduction system...if it gets 'cut' during surgery, she'll require a pacemaker. He estimates that it happens about 2% of the time.
-Obviously, one of the biggest challenges with Shawna is her mirror-image organs. The surgeon has to constantly re-orient himself with her heart. Something that I hadn't thought about? They also have to re-arrange the equipment in the OR, he will have to stand on the other side of the table, etc. Fortunately, there is a whole shlew of folks in the room to help.
-Just outta curiousity, I asked Dr. M about how many situs invertus cases he sees in a year. I know that her condition isn't common, but its not completely rare either. His response? Ten in his career. Wow. That's not a lot. The rarity of her condition also explains the exceptionally high number of fellows that we met this morning. Again-- these teaching hospitals get all geeked out about the less-than-common stuff.
Ok- I'm going to go wander around now... Still waiting for our surgical update.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry
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