Claire Hughes: Back to the Hospital #3

Well, that about sums it up. Claire is again in the hospital. Poor baby has had a lot of trouble the past few days with dialysis. Her peritoneal space is either absorbing the dialysis fluid thus leading her to retain a great amount of fluid, or is blocking the fluid from draining properly ending with the same result. Therefore, our little bird is now undergoing hemodialysis.

Don't know what hemodialysis is? Check out these great sites!

WebMD (most basic explanation)

The National Kidney Foundation

The Mayo Clinic

U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services (Not the best website to navigate)

Sadly, this means that Claire will be sedated and intubated for the next several days while the first treatment of the hemodialysis cycles the excess fluid from her blood. So far she has gone from around 400 mL of fluid over her dry weight to around 100 mL.

Her nephrology (kidney) doctor is considering keeping her hospitalized until she reaches a dry weight of 10 kg and can qualify for transplant. At the moment, her dry weight is somewhere between 8 kg and 9 kg. The family is expecting another two month stay, but who knows what will happen.

On a good note, she did see her orthopedic doctor who said that though it was not necessary as her hips are excellent, he would like to see her in her brace for another two months before calling it quits. Also, ECI (Early Childhood Intervention) did set up therapy times for her for the month of April to help her with her gross motor, language, and social functions to keep her on track. We are not sure how that will work while she is in the hospital, but she should be getting help as she grows.

March 24, 2015 Prepping for Easter with Grandma Hughes