Kaelyn and I have just come home from a two week stay at Children's. She had another 104 degree fever and we rushed her to the ER. She was admitted and her blood cultures came back positive with Citribacter bacteremia. In Laman's terms, her PICC line was infected with a really nasty bacteria. This caused her to have whats called ascites, or excessive abdominal fluid. The citribacter causes your blood vessels to be "leaky", so all of the normal fluid that is in you blood leaks out of the vessels into your body. The poor thing gained 6 pounds in water weight in only 2 days. She was so uncomfortable, it was awful. We gave her Lasix (diuretic) and Albumin (the portion of the blood that acts as a sponge to keep the water within the vessels). It took about 4 more days to get off all of the excess fluid and for her to feel better. We also had to take out her PICC line. So, she had to endure multiple IV's in order to get her IV antibiotics. Finally after about a week and a half on antibiotics the surgeons decided to put in a new central catheter line called a Broviac. It is basically like her old port, except it is external like the PICC line. It should last longer than the PICC and hopefully we can avoid infections like the ones she has had over the past few months. So, with the placement of this new line we were able to come home. Now I can administer the IV antibiotics at home. It is so much better to be home. Kaelyn loves it! She ran around the whole house just singing and dancing. She also could not wait to be home "and be a family" she said! She also said on the way out of the hospital "Mom, we're outta here!".
So, life should get back to the Perry form of "normal".
Love,
Angie
