Update 7

Rosenthal INC

Wired Thaddeus is wired from head to toe. He has a series of monitors attached to him. He also has two iv lines and a breathing tube. Later today he will have another line put in to give the surgery team a "central line" to administer anything needed. After the surgery he will have about double the number of things attached to him. Monitors and More Monitors Thaddeus is hooked up to many monitors that measure his oxygen levels, his breathing, his pulse, the CO2 levels of his exhales, and his blood flow.  A Rough 24 Hours Saturday night it was discovered that the lines that were put into Thaddeus' umbilical cord to give him medication and nutrition were starting to come out. It was decided to put an iv line into his leg in order to make sure that the medicine keeping him alive was getting into his body at a sufficient rate. Since his veins are so small, this is easier said than done. They managed to get a line in and switched the meds to that iv. An x-ray confirmed that the umbilical lines were indeed leaking. These were then removed and Sunday a second iv line was put into his other foot. He was doing very well and was even awake and looking around so we headed out for lunch. When we returned we bought back the five kids to visit Thaddeus. As we entered the room we found a team working on Thaddeus including someone "bagging" Thaddeus to force him to breath. While we were gone Thaddeus had stopped breathing. They had gotten him to breathe again. Unfortunately his breathing stopped again a while later. The doctors decided to give Thaddeus some caffeine to see if that would get him to keep breathing. It was explained to us that this can be a side effect of the drug that is used to keep him alive. While we were at the Ronald McDonald house to get some supper, the hospital called to tell us that Thaddeus had stopped breathing a third time so they were going to put a breathing tube in his nose and intubate him. This has a two fold function. It will make breathing easier for him to make him more likely to keep breathing on his own. Secondly it acts as an emergency back up. If he stops breathing again, it will force him to breath. Thaddeus was going to have to have a breathing tube for surgery so they will leave it until some time after surgery. While the breathing stoppage may have been caused by his meds, it is also possible he has an infection.Just to be safe, they have started him on antibiotics and have taken a blood culture to check for infections. If any sign of an infection turns up, the surgery will have to be post-poned. Right now Thaddeus is getting a PIC line put in. This is a large iv that will be used during and after surgery. They like to get it in ahead of time. Thaddeus is back. The PIC line insertion went well. He is temporarily paralyzed and totally out of it, but should be OK in a while.