Thaddeus Update 71

Why would I be scared?

Earlier this week, Jeremiah asked Thaddeus if he knew what was coming up on Friday. Thaddeus replied that he was going to the hospital. Jeremiah asked him if he was scared. Thaddeus scoffed and replied "It's just going to the hospital. Why would I be scared?"  So, here we sit in the all too familiar waiting room. Thaddeus has been a trouper, as usual, even though we got him up at 4:15 and he hasn't eaten since last night. As you know, his pulmonary arch is quite small. The doctor told us that it measures around 4mm in diameter. When you look at the MRI results, you can see that the arch is much smaller than the rest of the artery. As a result of this, only about 10-20% of the blood flow to his lungs is going to the left lung. Since the lung isn't getting blood, it isn't functioning at anything like the level they would want. Also, the diaphragm on his left side is creeping up into lung area. Obviously, neither is a good thing long term. So, today, they are going to do a catheterization. They go in through the femoral artery in the thigh and snake it on through to his pulmonary arch. When they are there, they are going to inflate a balloon and stretch out the arch. They'd like to get it to around 10mm if possible. Now, the problem with that is, by stretching the artery to 2.5 times its current size, it is possible that they could compress the airway. There isn't much point in giving the lung blood if it can't get air. As a result, while they do the balloon, a different doctor will be putting a camera up Thaddeus' nose and down into the airway located near the arch. This doctor will be watching to see if expanding the pulmonary arch affects the airway adversely. If they don't see any issues, they will deflate the balloon. There is a very small chance that this will leave the artery large enough and they will call it a day. This is very unlikely and the doctors do not anticipate leaving it like that. They are planning on putting in a stent if all else looks good.  If they see that expanding the arch causes issues elsewhere, especially the airway, they will not put in the stent. If that is the case, they will need to schedule Thaddeus for open heart surgery to move some things around to create more room in that area.     It will be a few more hours before they are done and we can figure out the next step. I'll talk to you after that.