Tests

Today they are going to do some tests to see if they can figure out the entire story because they don't want to send him home without it being safe.
I don't have a lot to tell you yet. He does have some granulation along the backside of his good vocal cord which is a result of the intubation problem with the last surgery. Dr. Smith, the ENT, thought that he had this problem instead of the croup and that was probably mis-diagnosed (but the treatment he got was the correct treatment for current problem anyway). Ammon appeared to be getting a little better so we had no reason to suspect otherwise until Monday night.
When he got here at the hospital, they admitted him on the medical floor and then during the night he had some episodes (sleep apena or whatever they want to call it) that caused them to move him into the ICU. They gave him some special treatments with helium (leaving Ammon with a "chipmunk" voice as he says) and oxygen. They gave him steroids and will keep him on some for about 10 days to help with the swelling. There is a slight possiblity that he may still have to have surgery to remove the granulation, but for now he seems to be much better and hopefully has escaped surgery altogether.
They are very concerned still and will do a brain MRI to make sure there isn't trouble with the decompression area at the brain stem. They made that decision because they heard strider breathing (high whistling sound) and that indicates shunt or brain issues. They are simply eliminating all possiblities of problems for the future. They will also conduct a sleep study tonight because his heart rate and oxygen levels drop dramatically when he is asleep. They are looking at the possiblity of sending us home with a c-pap machine. If that happens, we can't go home until at least Sunday because they have to know he can handle the machine and that he is stable with it. An EKG has also been ordered.
I'm really grateful Jim moved as quickly as he did to get him to the doctor and get him up here. I'm also very relieved I wasn't here that night to deal with the emergency on my own. Thank you, Jim!!
Ammon sounds much, much better today so we're hoping for a release tomorrow sometime. I will update this as I know more. He told us he would do a victory dance for us if he could just go home.
Mom