Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Searching For The Right Shunt

Carly’s recovery from her last surgery went very well and she was back to her smiling self pretty quickly.  This good run was pretty short lived though, as the same symptoms that we saw before the shunt revision started to come back just over a week after the surgery. Her seizures have returned and she has moments each day where we can just tell that she isn’t feeling well, with the likely cause being high intra-cranial pressure. Fortunately she still has many good moments each day, but it is looking like shunt number eleven is not working as well as it needs too.  Neurosurgery has adjusted the shunt to flow more easily, but so far that has not seemed to have any noticeable effect.  They have also tapped the shunt to see if an infection could be causing the clogging.  All of the early results from the cultures do not show an infection which is good.  There is one possible infection type that takes many days to show up in a culture so we have to wait until tomorrow to know if that type can be ruled out.  If the cultures look good, and her symptoms continue, she will most likely have another shunt revision surgery early next week.  Neurosurgery told us that they sometimes have cases like Carly where it takes numerous shunt revision surgeries to deal with clogging issues, but they assured us that eventually the shunts start to last. Hopefully Carly is near that point. You can help by visualizing her brain in a perfect state, with no problems from pressure.

Love, Brad

7 comments:

The Hallers said...

Whatever the next step is, it's a step towards her healthy, healing brain finding what suits it perfectly. Carly is going to shape these professionals into experts. Picturing Carly's days filled with comfort, smiles and all the love that the world has to give.
Love from the east side,

sheila said...

yes, we are visualizing a calm, comfortable and smiley little girl. Carly is absolutely close to finding the perfect shunt for her. sending you all love and thoughts of pressure-less perfection.

Paige said...

Picturing a beautiful brain for your beautiful girl. Hoping that the docs soon help Carly get back on her path of healing and comfort, and sending lots of love.

Lani said...

i will definitely visualize a working shunt for our little sweet carly. hoping you can still make it away for christa's bday- thinking about you 3 and sending all my love. xo

Laurel said...

i was really hoping this 11th shunt was going to work for carly. maybe 12 will be her lucky number? we are certainly visualizing a comfortable, pressure-free carly.
love, laurel & guido

Gal said...

Visualizing that, and so much light and warmth and health surrounding Carly's brain and her entire being. All of you guys. Miss you. Lots of love and a kiss on Carly's cute little nose.

TylerP said...

I'm visually picturing Carly's perfect brain...hoping she can smile more with less pressure...Love...-Jack*