Back in Hospital

In spite of our best efforts to keep germs at bay with near-fanatical hand-washing and copious amounts of Purell, Emma came down with cold late last week (Michaela, Eric and I have all been sick with colds over the holidays). Her very stuffy nose was soon followed by a nasty barking cough. Saturday night she started "desating" - having periods of low oxygenation - (we're still monitoring her heart rate and blood oxygen levels), and by Sunday she was even more congested and was not feeding well.

I brought Emma to the emergency department at CHEO early this a.m. and she was assessed by the triage team within minutes of our arrival (no waiting when you are a micropreemie, I guess). Given her condition, her chronic lung problems (bronchopulmonary dysplasia), and the fact that she was an extreme preemie, they decided not to take any chances and admitted her (mostly for observation). Thankfully, test results have come back negative for Respiratory syncytial virus [see http://www.rsvinfo.com/ and http://www.rsvprotection.com/ for more information on RSV] so that is a huge relief. At this point, the tentative diagnosis is viral bronchiolotis (apparently CHEO has had several babies admitted with it this winter).

By this evening, Emma was breathing a bit easier. She's been put on low-flow oxygen and seems to be less congested. The docs will reassess her condition tomorrow morning. As luck would have it, Eric is out-of-town on a business trip this week, so I wasn't able to stay in the hospital overnight with Emma (as Michaela is at home). It was incredibly hard leaving her there tonight. Hopefully her stay in hospital will be very short. I'll update more tomorrow.