Cardiologist Appointment

January 9th, 2008 | by Mom and Dad |

Kevin had his appointment today with Dr. Pyevich, his cardiologist. This was just a regular checkup and echo, since she has not seen him in almost a year.

Everything went well and there were no surprises. His blood pressure was good, his saturation level was at 98%, and she said things generally looked good. He had gained some more weight and now weighs 24 1/2 pounds, which puts him at the 8th percentile on the chart. He wasn’t very happy during the initial checkup, but he had a fun time in the waiting room with the other kids that were there.

Then came the echo, which we weren’t sure he would put up with at all. We got him laying down on some pillows and he was putting up quite a fit until we put a movie in the tv and the doctor gave him two suckers. Kevin loves suckers! So he was busy watching tv, licking each sucker and feeding them to us, and watching a light-up Pooh doll a nurse was holding. This kept him quiet and still long enough that they could get the views that the doctor wanted to see, much to our relief. We have an appointment scheduled for next Wednesday as well for a sedated echo, but hopefully this one will give them enough information that we won’t need to go back again. They will review the results in Iowa City on Monday and let us know if they want us to come in on Wednesday.

The only thing the doctor didn’t get a view of was his aortic arch, which had repaired along with his pacemaker surgery. To do that she needs to go up near his neck and he was having nothing to do with that. Since his pulse is good in his legs, she doesn’t think she will need to see that right now and it can wait another 6 months for his next echo when maybe he will be a little more cooperative.

After the echo we headed up to get a chest x-ray. Normally we do this before seeing the doctor, but it really makes him mad and we wanted him to be as calm as possible for the echo. We also didn’t have to do an EKG – either because they forgot or they decided he didn’t need one. This was a relief too, because he really hates getting all those stickers put on him and it’s a struggle for him to sit still long enough to get a good reading.

The x-ray was traumatic as always. The contraption they put him in to keep him still looks like something out of a torture chamber (see the pictures). We feel so sorry for the little guy, but he cries and takes it. They will look at the x-ray later too and let us know if there are any problems.

After the long morning, we stopped at McDonalds so he could “eat” some chicken nuggets and apple slices. We say “eat” because although he’s eating much better than he was, we always leave quite the mess under his high chair from the stuff he spits out or what doesn’t actually make it into his mouth.

So it was a slightly traumatic morning, but a good visit with no bad news – just the way we like it.