Continued Progress

A few updates:

Tricia was moved to a bigger room a few days ago.  Most of the rooms in the hospital are incredibly small, but four of the rooms on this ward are bigger than the rest.  This might not seem like a big deal, but for us it was a huge blessing.

She had her first big bronchoscopy yesterday.  She has been having bronchs nearly every day in her room, but they've been short and simple.  Yesterday's bronch took place down in the bronch suite downstairs under anesthesia.  They took a long look at everything and cleaned the lungs out and took some biopsies to check for rejection.  We have yet to hear anything, so we're assuming everything looked good.

Tricia passed her second swallow study this morning, which means she should finally be able to drink liquids and possible some soft foods.

We've been told if xray and blood gasses look good today, they may pull a few more chest tubes.  She has four remaining.

When I arrived this morning, Tricia was without an IV poll for the first time in several weeks.  She is down to just a few doses of IV meds/antibiotics a day, so she can now go several hours at a time without being connected.  Again, might not seem like a big deal, but it means a lot more freedom and mobility for Tricia.

She is still in some considerable pain, mostly due to the remaining chest tubes and the atrophy of her muscles.  She is walking a bit further every day, with her best being 14 laps two days ago (yesterday was a wash because of the bronch).

There is also talk of removing her trach before she is discharged.  The first transplant, Tricia kept her trach for a few weeks after she was discharged. 

In other news, Tricia was the first of around a dozen transplants over the past two weeks.  They always seem to come in waves.  The surgical team has been busy, and we have seen several friends join us on the stepdown unit, for which we are thankful.

Thank you for your continued prayer!

Nate