Good news!

Praise the Lord for good news! For starters, the "seizures" Elijah was having are now thought to be withdrawal symptoms from the morphine. He is only having the shakes after each decrease in the morphine and also they (the shakes) will stop when a hand is laid gently on him and then begin again when the hand is moved off. Today was all good reports! They are decreasing two of the medicines right now without any negative side effects. His oxygen intake is now at 72%. And to top it all off -- the brain bleeds are shrinking! This means the veins that "sprung a leak" are closing up and healing and the body is absorbing the blood back into its system. Isn't our God GREAT?! There is mighty power in prayer. God says, "Whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive." -- Matthew 21:22

Seizure

Elijah suffered a seizure Thursday night. Doctors are not exactly sure what caused it. Therefore, we don't know if this is a one-time occurrence or if we should expect more. Teresa would like to think that it was a withdrawal from morphine since this is one of the meds he is being weaned off of right now. Please pray for wisdom from the doctors to know how to "diagnose" this issue.

As for Michael & Teresa, they have been taking Romans 8:28 and finding the good in this bad situation. "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God . . ." They have been able to see God teaching them in several different ways and have also been able to be a support to other families there at the hospital.

Elijah's picture

Here's a picture of Elijah!

Bleeding stopped?

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.

Good news and bad news

Baby Elijah came off the ECMO with good numbers. His heart seems to be working fine, even through the stress test they did this morning. His kidneys and other major organs are all functioning well. However, the MRI they did on the brain showed a second brain bleed spot. There is not much they can do for this until the blood thinner medication is out of his system, which will take a couple of days. They are planning to do another MRI on Thursday to see what brain damage he may have. Until then, they will be weaning him slowly off the respirator and other medications.

A correction: This is Teresa, Elijah's mom. Thank you everyone for your prayers. God is answering them in His way and in His time. The only correction to the update is that there is not MRI's being done on him, he is not stable enough for that yet, rather brain ultrasounds. An MRI will be done later. Whatever damage has been done cannot be reversed and it would be too traumatic to him to do an MRI now if not necessary.

Grab a button

Here is our button for Elijah. Please spread the word and add it to your blog, using one of two methods below.

If you use Blogger (or any blog that supports Google gadgets), add a gadget, click on "Add your own" at the bottom left corner of the "Add a gadget" window, then type in http://www.ece.msstate.edu/~bjones/elijah.xml and click "Add by URL."

For other blogs, paste this HTML code into your blog's sidebar:

<div align="center"><br /><a href="http://babyelijah-pray.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.ece.msstate.edu/~bjones/elijah.jpg" /></a><br />Learn how to <a href="http://babyelijah-pray.blogspot.com/2009/02/grab-button.html" target="_blank">add</a> this button to your blog!</div>

Thanks for supporting Elijah and his family with your posts and your prayers!

Urgent prayer needed

The Ryan family is in need of a lot of prayer power right now. The ECMO machine that little Elijah has been on requires a blood thinner. This somehow has caused the brain to bleed. They reduced the blood thinner medication as much as they possibly could, but the bleeding has gotten worse. In an effort to hopefully prevent brain damage, the doctors are pulling him off the ECMO today as quickly as possible (within just a couple of hours). This is normally a two-day process. They feel that the heart is ready for this; the rest of the organs are functioning properly at this time. Please pray that the heart will be able to work properly on its own after coming off the machine. Pray also that God will intervene further and allow there to be no brain damage. They will be doing an MRI as soon as they can get him stablized once he is off the ECMO. Please pray also for Michael and Teresa. This is a very critical point and a very emotionally draining day for them. Pray that God will continue to sustain them and give them the peace that passes all understanding throughout this time.