Pulmonology Report

We took big Suttie (he weighed in at over 10 lbs) to his appointment today.  He had all of the nurses swooning over his big, blue eyes:).  We were so lucky that Sutton's nurse turned out to be a NICU nurse who was helping out at the clinic!  You know how we love those NICU nurses!!  She was so impressed with how great Sutton looked knowing how early he was born.  We immediately felt that Sutton was in good hands after meeting her.

Poor little guy had to have some more x-rays, but was an absolute champ and hardly fussed at all!  The x-ray showed that his stomach was pushed up fairly high which is what is compromising the left lung's full function.  The pulmonologist has narrowed the lung issue down to three possibilities now:  diaphragmatic hernia, diaphragmatic eventration, or diaphragmatic paralysis (that last one sounds just awful, but it's ok).  She seems to be leaning towards the hernia, which would most likely require surgery in the near future.  Essentially, any of the 3 could require surgery, but in order to figure out the diagnosis and its severity, he will have a CT scan and ultrasound on June 17.  

Andrew and I had a difficult time fully understanding the doctor's explanation of each issue, her accent was very thick.  We had her write them down knowing we would call the boys' Uncle O'Connor, I mean Dr. O'Connor:).  We did catch the NICU nurse on the way out and she told us she had seen all 3 of these many times and that Suttie would be just fine (she also gave me a big old hug- yea, she was most definitely a NICU nurse:)).

We called Dr. O'Connor and he echoed the nurse's words.  He said while these issues are fairly uncommon in the grand scheme of things, it's not an uncommon thing for pediatric surgeons to deal with.  He also advised us to NOT Google these issues as they might sound worse than they are.  I told him we were completely comfortable with letting him be our Google.

So... All in all, the visit was fine, Sutton is in great hands, and Lawson was spoiled all day by Grandma Lulu!

(Sutton didn't seem to mind the trip at all!)