Saturday, February 5, 2011

Happy At Home

Carly was discharged late yesterday and we are back at home again. Her recovery from this surgery is probably her best yet, and she slept well through the night last night. She is a bit uncomfortable from her two incisions, but Tylenol seems to be helping and after a few days that should pass. She is one tough and amazing little girl.

During her surgery they took a sample of her CSF to check for infection and other cell counts.  The initial results for an infection do not show anything, and it is pretty unlikely that this is an issue.  The protein levels did come back very elevated again which was not expected. As you might remember, this was an issue for Carly last spring and many of her shunt failures last year were attributed to high protein. At one point last year her protein level was 30 times the normal level but it had dropped quite a bit over the last few months. It is now back up to about 20 times the normal level but the cause is a mystery. We will follow up with neurosurgery next week to see if they have any additional insight but for now we'll just wait and see, hoping that this shunt can last awhile. Thanks for the love and support, we can feel it each day.

Love, Brad

5 comments:

Catherine said...

Welcome home! I hope you had a chance to enjoy the weather today with your sweet little girl. xoxo!

karen said...

I'm so happy she is home and hope she is healing well.
XOXO

lance said...

Go Carly, go! You are amazing! Sending warm vibes of healing and comfort. I know your preschool buddies are awaiting your return. :-)

Hugs and love,
Lance and Mark

sheila said...

She is the most amazing little girl, no doubt about that! i hope the protein level issue gets sorted and that she recovers well from the surgery so she can return to her little boyfriend at school (how cute is that?!)

we are sending lots of prayers your way for a lasting shunt and healthful progress,
sheila and keith

Heather & Seth said...

Really great to hear that you guys are back home and hopefully recoupin' is going smoothly and quickly! Gotta get Carly back to school and her cute friend! :)