Patient Brayden

Brayden is in the hospital.

His vomiting was really bad yesterday. He was vomiting blood. Mostly coffee grounds type blood but as the day progressed it was looking more and more fresh.

By the afternoon we knew he had to go in.

We asked to be sent to INOVA Fairfax instead of Children's because we have been waiting to see a new GI specialist who is out of Fairfax. Thinking we might be able to see him and have whatever tests may be needed, we headed to Fairfax.

Brayden was in the ER. They ran some blood work, x-rays, swabs, etc. Things were coming back normal. The ER doctor came in to tell us that if everything came back normal Brayden would be sent home.

I was getting ready to give a case for Brayden to stay in the hospital on IV fluids to give his gut a rest...we have been down this road a few times before and know the routine. However, it has always been through Children's and we were starting from scratch at Fairfax. I was starting to feel anxious about trying to convince the doctor that he had to stay. Not that we want him to stay at the hospital but sending him home would not be the best answer. So I was prepared to have that discussion.

The ER doctor came back in to the room, I toke and deep breath preparing to bring up a stay at the hospital and before I could she starting talking about Brayden's pancreas.

Now Brayden has had most of his body looked over (several times) but never the pancreas. I pretty sure my eyes widened with questions with the mention of his pancreas. Apparently Brayden's pancreas level (I do not yet know the proper terms) was 4x the amount it should be; normal is at 200 his was at 800.

Needless to say, Brayden was being admitted.

This random ER doctor, whom I was starting to question just in the short time we were there, thought to look at his pancreas. This could be a piece of the puzzle to Brayden's GI difficulties. It is my understanding that the pancreas is a problem but more of an indicator of another problem...what that is, who knows yet. It could be acute or chronic.

When I spoke to Jeremy this morning, Brayden vomited blood again. The plan is for him to have an ultrasound to look at the liver and pancreas, then possibly a CT to get a better picture. He will be on IV fluids for a couple of days until they figure out what to do.

Brayden slept ok last night but seemed to have several seizures. We know that his heart rate increases and O2 decreases but the staff at Fairfax was still extremely alarmed each time it happened and ready to pump him with oxygen. So that disrupted a bit of the night.

Please pray for clear results from the tests and a good direction to go. Also for Brayden's seizure activity to be at a minimum...we do not need to deal with that right now.