Baby Elijah is holding up well. He had three scans done yesterday: heart, brain and liver. All results came back about the same as before. Improvement would have been nice, but at least nothing is getting worse. The brain bleeds have not grown any since the last scan. Hopefully, and assumedly, that means the bleeding has stopped. By the way, the last brain scan, as well as this one, was an ultrasound, not an MRI. He still is not stable enough to handle an extensive MRI. As of late yesterday afternoon, his oxygen intake was down to 75%. They are trying to wean him off 1% per hour. At one point, they had decreased it by 4%, but then he struggled and they had to increase it again by 5%. (Two steps forward, three steps back. It's rather frustrating.) They had to give it a rest for a little while before being able to continue.
It is somewhat urgent to have him off of the oxygen so that they can start bottle feeding him. The medication that is supplying nutrients to his body, in combination with the fact that he is not taking in any sustenance for which the liver needs to function, is causing jaundice.
The weaning process is a slow one. Because he is on so many different meds, and they can only wean him off one at a time, the Ryans are looking at being there in Arkansas for at least two months.
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