We're looking at a likely diagnosis of gastroparesis, which is where the stomach empties slowly. Too slowly. This, with his severe acid reflux, seems to be the primary reason for the vomitting, but teething and a cold haven't helped.
The two medications Job is on do seem to help (omeprazole as an acid neutralizer and reglan as a motility agent).
We have and will continue to investigate diet, but allergies don't seem to be the issue. Our next step would be an endoscopy if things don't improve in a month. We then also need to consider an NJ tube. I didn't realizing a feeding tube was even on the table and the very idea of moving so far backwards is crushing. (But, you know, so would be continued weight loss.)
We have learned how to manage his care in ways that seem to help, like giving 2oz of milk every 2 hours instead of 5oz every 3+ hours. Since he's both getting less milk and still vomiting we'll likely begin fortifying again for greater caloric density. His weight loss seems to have stopped but we have yet to see significant weight gain again.
We haven't even tried to wean off oxygen nor will we for a while. Likewise many of his therapy goals are on pause.
Job's cath is scheduled for December 8th. It will be at least one night inpatient and I think we're all expecting interventions, which might mean a longer hospital stay.
This isn't where we expected to be two months post-Glenn and it's been hard to realize that emotionally but it's been especially hard to just deal with practically. Harder even than when we had bigger cardiac issues, weirdly enough. But it seems like we're starting to emerge from the worst of it? We're at least in a brief respite and very grateful for it, especially because Job isn't so constantly miserable. He's even happy sometimes! Each day this week has been an improvement on the day before.
No comments:
Post a Comment