Unscheduled Stay !

Tonight I'm home with something I hate , an empty bedroom , Eloise's bedroom. I feel unsettled and uneasy when she's meant to be asleep in the bedroom next to mine. Millie's on school camp she's having fun, it was planned she's meant to be there. Eloise is in hospital, it wasn't planned and I want her home.

      Today Eloise was due to have her bloods taken on CIU ( Clinical Investigation Unit ) at 8.30am, we dropped Henry off at Breakfast Club and carried on walking to the hospital. Eloise who normally marches along was lagging behind, she felt breathless and looked pale , we rested awhile as we'd just walked up a hill. We continued on a little further but the breathless feeling came back. I rang work explained the situation and K kindly sent our G to come and collect Eloise in a wheelchair. He dropped us in A/E.

    Eloise was triaged, noticed to have a temperature of 38.4 , other observations all normal. Taken to a cubicle for a 12 lead ECG which showed changes but then again a heart transplant patients ECG does as they are in left bundle branch block from having servered nerve pathway etc. Seen by a registrar and examined , bloods taken , paracetamol given and in view of breathlessness Eloise is sent for an X-ray. Remember going there in 2002 when Eloise was diagnosed, shudder. The X-Ray showed patchy changes , so Eloise was diagnosed with community acquired pneumonia and given a weeks course of oral Amoxicillin. Cardiology were informed of her admission to A/E and decided they'd see her as planned in clinic at 2.15pm , so she could see her usual consultant .

        

   At 2.15 back to clinic, normal B/P and heart rate etc, grown again and put on weight. Eloise had her ECG it was noted that her ankles were puffy, kind of cankles I guess ! She does occasionally get a bit puffy. Then seen by her consultant Dr M and examined, he said Ivabradine can make you a bit puffy. The dreaded echo is then performed, heart function looked the same as normal, no changes with pericardial effusion, phew. My own heart regulates a little at this news, at least in Bristol the cardiology techs talk to you rather than an uneasy silence of doom !

           Dr M rechecks echo he's happy, but thinks Eloise needs  monitoring and would benefit from intravenous antibiotics, to get her to bounce back quicker. Site team contacted and a bed is found on the cardiac ward. Eloise settles in, the dreaded cannulation wasn't too bad, second try and the iv Augmentin has commenced. Eloise's CRP level is slightly raised as is her white blood count. Her creatine is also a little high. Eloise is slightly pyrexia and coughing a bit but generally feels ok and believe it or not happy ! I love that child :-) . Tomorrow the infection Control team and immunologists will be contacted to see if this is the best treatment regime for Eloise with her being immune suppressed. Eloise's Tacro level was taken 2 hours late but it was still 7.6 so I think this will need to be rechecked as in snother blood test before any adjustments are made to her dose. I told them only Gosh must change her immune suppression medications not them ! 

    

       

                      A very tired Eloise, she's not upset, she's yawned and got watery eyes ! 

All the staff have been incredibly lovely today and again I am reminded why I moved to Bristol, to work in a Childrens Hospital and why I won't leave as Eloise gets looked after so well. X