Tuesday, June 30, 2009

ICU Day 12

It's been a quiet day and the night promises to be the same. It's a waiting game right now with the surgeons. As usual, everyone is a slave to their schedule. I'm hoping they can do it soon so that Andre can be alert on July 3rd--our special day.

The highlight of the day is that Andre, fully sedated and with the breathing tube down his throat, breathe on his own for more than 10 hours. There was really no reason to restart the ventilator but the respiratory technician wanted to give Andre some rest for the night. This proves to me that as far as lung mechanics and physiology is concerned, there is nothing wrong with Andre. I think what happened yesterday is still the inability of the docs to find the right level of sedation to balance consciousness and pain control. When they took out the breathing tube yesterday, Andre was not awake enough to cough out all the secretions in his lung that were blocking his breathing. He'll still need to be able to do this even with a tracheostomy tube but if he can't, it will be easier for the docs to put him back on the ventilator compared to re-intubating him through the mouth.

So even with an excellent breathing trial today, the plan remains the same: tracheostomy. I'll let you know when the surgeons get their act together.

3 comments:

Roobeedoo said...

That's really great! Surely proof he is getting stronger all the time? Hugs.

Unknown said...

Thanks for all the updates Ed!

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