Cloud Nine

A couple of months ago I wrote about us needing a new pediatrician. We got the referral and had our first appointment with 'Dr. O' yesterday. Wow! That about sums it up for me.

Dr. O spent a whole hour with us. AN HOUR. Can I say it again? He spent sixty whole minutes with us. That is more than Dr. P spent with us over the course of a year. I know the appointments will not need to be that long again, but he was so thorough and answered ALL of my questions and took action on the unknowns I expressed.

What were my questions?

On Mikail's discharge papers from the Stollery Children's Hospital in May of 2010 there was a list of follow-up things that needed to be done. Why haven't they been done? One seems extremely important. It is a thrombophili blood work up on Mikail, Jason and myself. This is to see if Mikail (or either of us as his parents) have a blood clotting issue that could have contributed to the stroke he had. Dr. O didn't understand why this wasn't done before we left the Stollery over a year ago. This is significant because IF Jason or I have issues with this there could be a possibility that all of our children will be at risk--that it is a genetic disorder. YIKES. This would have been good to know especially considering this. We don't believe that is, considering the 38 hours of labour Mikail had to endure and the skull fracture he had, but it is still something that needs to be ruled out...just like a heart condition was ruled out in those first few days of his life. So, Dr. O is going to make some calls to doctor's in Edmonton and see if it is acceptable to have these blood tests done by a hematologist here. We will find out early next week what the verdict is.

My other question had to do with the areas of the brain that the stroke affected. Most of the issues have been dealt with through testing or therapies, but one area hasn't been and my question is 'why'? We knew that his vision might be compromised, but that was ruled out as 'normal' in May of 2011 after an extensive Pediatric Neuro-Ophthalmologist appointment. The other areas of the brain that could have been affected are motor skills, speech and language, and social and behavioural portions of the brain. Motor skills and speech and language have been dealt with at therapies. So, why haven't social and behavioural factors been touched on? We haven't noticed any odd behaviours or anything, but I am just curious as to when these would show up if there were issues. Dr. O was able to answer that for me as well. It is one of those 'wait and see' things. Our job right now is to raise him with good behavioural boundaries and socialize him as we would any 13 month old. When he is in grade one we will begin to notice whether or not any of that portion of the brain was truly affected and then in grade 3 when the logical part of the brain is developed more we will see how he does with logic. So, it's a 'wait and see' thing and we are doing everything we can at this point to make him successful in these areas.

My last question? Will a follow-up MRI be done? The curious Mama in me would love to see the original MRI beside an MRI done now to see the difference. Dr. O agreed that it would be interesting but there is no medical reason to have one done. It would be more beneficial to have one done when he is just over 2 years old. A baby's brain stops growing when they are two, so we still have about 11 months of 'brain healing' and time for new connections to be made in his little brain before it is fully developed. Wow. Heal, brain, heal.

That was the extent of my questions and besides the knowledge that there may be a slight chance that we have a genetic disorder that may affect future children's chances of having a stroke, I walked out of that office on cloud nine.

Oh and this video pretty much puts me on cloud nine too: