Caden has been moved out of the PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit) into a regular private room (new wing) of the MUSC Children’s Hospital. That is the good news. The bad news is that he popped a 102.6 fever this evening. His heart rate has been very high as a result. There has been no real speculation on what has caused the fever. However Caden has been tugging at his ears and he is no longer on the anti-biotic that we began last week to treat the sinus and ear infects. Sherry and I believe the ears is likely causing the fever. As of this hour (10 PM Wednesday) he is sleeping and there are signs the fever is about to break. He is sweating and his heart rate is slowly coming down.
Cardiology Update
Caden’s sedated echo cardiogram showed no change with his heart. The cardiologist are comfortable with how the repair of the aorta has held up since Caden’s last open-heart surgery. In even better news, Caden is off telemetry now and showed absolutely no signs of heart block while being monitored in the OR and PICU.
Pain Management
Caden’s pain medication (Morphine drip) was more than doubled this evening. He was getting .4 MG with breakthrough doses every four hours. The breakthrough doses did seem to help some initially, but today he has been in pain pretty much all day. Sherry said he grunted even in his sleep. Now they have him on a 1.0 MG drip and he is much more comfortable.
Caden’s Little Neighbor
It was a very long night in the ICU last night after I completed the blog post. I had just been asked to leave the ICU due to the condition and amount of work having to be done on the little girl in the bed next to Caden. I had the privilege of praying for this little girl with her mom and grandma. Her grandmother is a great woman of faith and I could tell beyond a shadow of a doubt that this lady had a personal relationship with Jesus.  We paced the halls of the 8th floor of the Children’s Hospital and prayed for nearly two hours for their little girl and every child in the ICUs. Finally the doctor finally came out to tell the mom and grandmother that they had stabilized their little girl. It was such a joy to share the night hours with this family and see the power of God at work when the medical professionals were loosing hope.
Praises
- Caden’s continued recovery and move out of the ICU
- Willingness for doctors and nurses to listen to parental input
- Family (Nana) serving us by taking care of Riley, Josiah, and Levi
- No evidence of heart block and off telemetry
Prayer Requests for Caden
- Protection from fevers
- Protection from infection
- Free from pain
- Rapid healing for Caden
Prayer Requests for Sherry and me
- Protection for our health
- Safety as each of us travels over 50 miles round-trip
- Humility with hospital staff
- Discernment
- Time to share with Riley, Josiah, and Levi
- Continued understanding and support from my employer