Over 72 Hours

Well it seems that the new antibiotics have been effective in getting rid of James' fevers. We of course are excited and hopeful about this, but as time keeps ticking our excitement lessens as we are not seeing any difference in his oxygen needs. Occasionally we can get him down to 1.5L, but most of the time he's at 2-2.5L

Sometimes it makes things more confusing when there is more then one department offering their opinion, other times it opens your eyes to reality and helps you to be more prepared. Infectious Control stopped by this morning. There were a couple things they had different opinions on, but the one that sticks out is the fact that they aren't so confident that an infection is James' problem. The fever has been controlled, so there may have been an infection, but by this time we should be seeing a decrease in oxygen levels. They also feel he looks to good to have an infection. So in their opinion there's probably two things going on, we've gotten the infection under control but the PAP is not under control.

This is a hard call to make and the Team feels given James' situation they think we should give the antibiotics a full week before we make any further decisions. Given that James' macrophages don't work well this makes sense as he could simply need more time for his lungs to recuperate. So Infectious Contrl makes us realize that a normal child would have improved by now, and the Team reminds us that James is not normal.

James' stool came back positive for C.Diff. Since C.Diff can come from antibiotics or if already there can be aggrevated by antibiotics, we have no idea if it was ever gone, although it's not likely. So he will be restarted on medication for that as well, hoping to tame down the current diarrhea due to the antibiotics he's on. This time he'll probably have to carry on the medication for about 10 days after the antibiotics are done, so this leaves use somewhat unable to further investigate his colitis and stomach issues at this time.

Well I enjoyed my time home and made sure I packed a big box with lots of projects to keep me busy over the next couple weeks so I don't have too much time to think about what I'm all missing. Rob has decided to have the girls home this week and see how that works out. (When he made this decision he didn't realize they have 3 days off this week). Since he dropped his Hebrew course he is now home by 3pm each day for when they come home from school. He'll give it a try and see how much it effects his study time. Even Rebecca, who's always asking who's house she gets to go to next, was excited when I told her she was staying home this week. Marietta has her ups and downs. She's usually okay when she's away, but has a hard time saying good-bye again at the end of the weekend. And Matthew doesn't even seem to realize what's going on, which I suppose is a good thing.