Today I attempted to take both the girls for bloodwork. Mike kept Micah, K was at the church still, my mom came with me. It should be pretty easy: hold child, stick arm, draw blood, scream, kiss it, go home.
But not in my family. No, especially not with two "Cardiac kids" as they so lovingly are called by the workers. Cardiac kids are a hard stick. So hard, in fact, that after two attempts (once digging until Momma put a stop to that!) they still didn't get a single drop from Brianna. No go there. Then on Emma they got it started but only got enough for about 3 of the 8 tests she needs done. Not that she HAD to have them all done at once, but they all need to be done! We opted for the Tetanus Titer (to find out if she's got the antibodies or not) and the CBC. That will at least give us something to go on. I hope the rest of hers can wait until preop for her surgery. The Tetanus was the biggest one we needed so she can be immunized before surgery if she's not already.
I have no idea what we're going to do for Brianna. I called the office and asked if we could get orders for the local children's hospital where they have a cardiac ward. No word back. Looks like I'll call them again tomorrow. In the mean time both my girls have awful bruises- Emma especially- and they still need more tests :(
I hear you, sister. When my son was on experimental meds, he was supposed to have blood draws every 6 weeks. NOT! Let's see, he has DS and a heart defect and lung issues. He has little tiny veins that are extremely hard to poke and very little blood would come out if you did manage to poke a vein. He'd scream til he was blue, literally. Don't have a good option other than the children's hospital option you are pursuing. I wish you luck. I've run across a few good people who were able to stick on the first try and get the blood. But most times, it was major trauma.
ReplyDeleteJan
I've read drink lots of fluids before and heat the arm or where trying to find vein helps.
ReplyDeleteLu