Answers for ROP

Well Luke had another ROP exam on Tuesday. For once Jonathin and I stayed in the room while they did it. That doesn't me I was watching, but I was there. We wanted some answers. The NNP's have tried to explain it to me, but we wanted to actually talk to the eye people themselves. There are three zones in an eye, the innermost is 1 and then moves out to three. They are watching the arteries as they form in Luke's eyes. 7 weeks ago when they first checked him he was only in zone 1. That means he could only see straight ahead really. Slowly he has moved to 2, which is where he is now. So he can see some peripheral, but nothing too far to the side of him. No this week his left eye got a little worse, but his right eye stayed about the same. So, his left eye the blood vessels are a little compacted and are not trying to stretch out to zone 3. This worries them some, because these blood vessels can tighten and pull the retina from the eye and Luke would be blind. Think of Ray Charles. This is exactly what happened to him, he was a preemie and they gave him all kinds of oxygen to have him grow. Well Luke's eyes were set in this path during the first 4 weeks of his life. He is a "jetter" so this is nothing new for them to watch. If things get worse then we will have to do laser surgery. Nothing too big, they just help hold the retina in place. The vessels start figuring things out around 36-38 weeks. Well Luke is 38, but the size or a 35 1/2 weeker. So, they are telling us in the next week and half to two we should know where we are going with this. Sometimes it just works itself out and other times it will need the laser. I asked if that will hold us back and make us stay here longer. They tell us no, we will just have to come back for checks and if they decide to do laser we would just be admitted for a day or two then we would go back home. They were a lot more optimist than the NNP's. On other news, Luke is doing so well on the 2 liters that on Thursday our goal is to turn him down to 1 and see how that goes. If he handles it then we will be on regular oxygen on Friday! I never thought we would get here. Once we get here we have a whole list of things to get through. We need a sleep study to see what his level at home will be. We need to learn his calories he will be going home on. We have to learn about the monitors, oxygen, and cpr. It might seem like a lot, but we are finally getting to talk about home. One last note, Jonathin had a nice scare with Luke last night and I don't think diapers are his specialty. Luke's head is raised just a bit to help with his reflux and Jonathin went to change a poopy diaper. Apparently Jonathin thought that Luke can handle being bent like a pretzel and cut in half. Luke did not agree and decided to "desatt" to the 30's and brady to the 60's....Luckily Melody noticed. Jonathin said he suspended himself from the NICU. However, that only lasted around 30 minutes. I however have a feeling this will be his case why he can no longer change a poopy diaper.

Jordan