Monday, May 31, 2010

CPAP

I am so glad they put the chest tubes in! Ammon is not so happy about it. They have continued to drain fluid and have made breathing easier for him. Dr. Delgado, Troy (RT) and Jean tried to take him off of the ventilator yesterday morning - well, technically he is still off... After a few hours he started to struggle quite a bit and his blood gasses looked terrible so they put him on CPAP. Its basically the ventilator through his nose. Ugh - he looks terribly uncomfortable. It only goes in as far as a regular nasal canula, except it pushes air in really hard to help his lungs inflate - kind of like putting a couple of straws in your nose and having someone blow in them really hard. It looks pretty funny actually - its attached to a beanie on his head. At least his throat gets a rest.
I don't know how long he will be on the CPAP. He has had a lot of adelectesis (collapse) and struggles to keep his upper right lung open, but the doctor said its not terribly uncommon and should fix itself. I hope it doesn't take long. Poor kid.

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