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As many of you know, Brian and I went to CC a couple of weeks ago. Yesterday, we finally got a plan. CC still doesn't have a diagnosis for us but they talked to Brian's doctors from home and came up with a plan based on everyone's best guesstimate. Unfortunately, they have decided on steroids...

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/170920.php An innovative method is being used to repair the breastbone after it is intentionally broken to provide access to the heart during open-heart surgery. The technique uses a state-of-the-art adhesive that rapidly bonds to bone and accelerates...

Hopefully Brian and I will be on a plane to CC tomorrow. He is having a bad night and has had a bad weekend so I really hope we make it on the plane and can get some answers. He starts bright and early Tuesday morning with tests and doctors. He is seeing 6 doctors so far and having a renal...

My 16 year old was at his dad's for the weekend and walked in this morning saying he was sick. I called Brian's nurse practitioner and she told me to get Shane to urgent care. Doc said, Yep, he has swine flu. They put both Brian and Shane on Tamiflu. Did I mention that Brian and I are...

Yeah! We finally got the approval, but are still waiting for the actual details. I know we will be going in the next 3 weeks. We are seeing Dr. Gorlich for the possible Fibromuscular Dysplasia and Dr. Laars Svenson (surgeon?) and also a cardiologist, rheumatologist and nephrologist. At least...

Brian has been having terrible headaches - to the point that he is asking for pain killers. The only new drugs he is taking are hydralizine and celexa. He used to take Lisinopril but it is REALLY bad if you have renal stenosis so they are afraid to put him back on it. Headaches are listed as...

I just can't believe it. He is in renal failure (creatinine 2.8) and of course heart failure (BNP rising at 1400). Warning - selfish rant coming - I don't know how much more we can take. I am so tired of feeling like we live on the edge of a cliff. I am sitting in an extremely...

The good news: They called us at 8 this morning and said that they had decided not to do the left heart cath/angiogram but that they wanted Brian to have an echo and a meeting with the doctors. Brian is part of the "transplant" group at his hospital and all of the transplant docs get together...

So Brian had a CT angiogram to check his bypasses and they found that one bypass is 90% blocked and another is partially blocked. His cardiologist was out of the country so they scheduled a left heart cath/angio as soon as he got back. It is this Thursday, the doc wants to look for himself and...

Thank you all for your prayers because I think they are working. They decided to do a renal CT today in spite of his creatinine being at 5.2 (the dye for the CT is REALLY hard on the kidneys). Lo and behold, they found that the artery feeding the kidney was almost completely closed. They...

The right heart cath is done and they are really confused now. They are saying that his cardiac output is almost normal (though he was on a small dobutamine drip at the time). They are calling the kidney guy back in and saying that they think the problem is his kidney not his heart. I don't...

They finally got some fluid off him, but that is putting him into renal failure. Latest echo shows an EF of only 25%-30%. He has a right heart cath tomorrow to get a better idea of his pressures, but otherwise they are starting to use the transplant word. He is doing well when he just lays...

Brian just hasn't recovered from the last time he was in here. If you remember he came in about a month ago with renal failure. They gave him IV fluids which helped his kidney but got him pretty fluid overloaded. They lasixed him in the hospital but he has continued to retain fluid since he...

This is probably a stupid question, but is pulmonary hypertension the same as having high pulmonary pressure? I know Brian's pulmonary pressure has been high since he was in the hospital and he is complaining of more shortness of breath since he got out. Nancy, can you give me some insight?

Yeah! They sprung him today. His creatinine is still a little high at 1.4. His INR is 2.7. They want to see him in a week and said that he can't go more than 2 months without seeing his cardiologist - we had been trying to stretch it to every 3-4 months. They are very cautious with him...

Brian got the flu and took too much Lasix. He got dehydrated and his creatinine is 3.0 which means his one remaining kidney is not doing well. Please pray for us.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/148954.php Kimberly Skelding, M.D., FACC, FAHA, FSCAI, associate, Interventional Cardiology at Geisinger Medical Center, director of Cardiovascular Genomics and Cardiovascular Research at the Sigfried and Janet Weis Center for Research and director of...

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/148629.php Chemical Found In Medical Devices Impairs Heart Function Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have found that a chemical commonly used in the production of such medical plastic devices as intravenous (IV) bags and...