Sunday, April 5th - Update

Hi okay bit of a long update. Just talked to the transplant doctor who has been treating mom this week. There are a few areas of concern for them. The first is the air in the plural space. Typically the lung tissue sticks next to the chest cavity and slides up and down as you breathe. When you have air in that space it means that the lung is not expanding fully which is a pneumothorax. Typically a chest tube can let the air out and allow the lung to fill the space but new scans show no improvement for mom. Due to the severity of the infectious tissue in her plural space they had to remove a lot during the transplant which caused lots of bleeding and scar tissue. They are calling it a complex plural space situation. 

Another factor is her diaphragm is very weak. During surgery they stretch it out and it could have gotten damaged. That plus the years of little use pre transplant, moms diaphragm (named Diana) has some catching up to do. This can take months and isn’t helping her lungs fill the space. This leads to the bottom of the lungs (which sit on Diana) to stop working as well and can lead to pneumonia or more infection as the tissue becomes stuck and the lungs cannot expel the mucus. 

The new scans show “thickening” of her left lung lining and tissue which indicates inflammation. This could be from inflection, fungal or bacterial and she is on a broad spectrum antibiotic and anti fungal. This means that the tissue is not as healthy as we want and can lead to fibrosis and restrict movement. It can also be causing the air in the plural space and keeping the tissue from joint together (which we want)This combined with the weak diaphragm puts the bottom of her left lung in a not so great position. 

This yesterdays  ultrasound showed that the clot in her left arm is there but they don’t want to give her more anti-clotting medication due to her history of bleeding. They did another ultrasound this morning to check for clots in both legs due to overnight swelling. Still waiting for results. They will treat with elevation and movement. 

The good news is that she is responding well to the ventilator settings and they will continue to progress her slowly. They don’t want to push her lungs too hard knowing everything they are dealing with internally. Despite everything she is in good spirits and has been working soooo hard. We are all SOOOOOO PROUD of her. Quite the fighter. Go mom!