Is the mystery solved?

Yesterday, Logan had a bronchoscopy. This was like one of the final tests that could be done to figure out what happened to him. The procedure was supposed to look into his airway, windpipe all the way down to his lungs to see if everything was fine. It's always been suspected that his muscle tone around his neck was floppy and maybe this could give us more information about why he's not taking in enough oxygen.

The procedure was supposed to happen at 11 a.m. but when I got to the hospital, the nurse told me the people got there early and had some problem with the tube being the wrong size. This was supposed to be a bedside procedure which only needed 5-10 minutes. During rounds in the morning (where all doctors and nurses sat together to discuss each case and parents are welcome), the doctor told me the procedure would happen at 3 p.m. They had to wait for this Pediatric Pulmonologist to finish up a procedure at 3 p.m. and then immediately work on Logan. If we missed this day, the doctor won't be available for another 2 weeks, or Logan would have to be transported to Oakland or Santa Clara.

We waitied for the pulmonologist to come and she didn't arrive until 4 p.m. Logan had to be transported to another floor to get this procedure done. The doctor explained that she would numb Logan's nose, then put a fiber optic tube down his nose to look all the way down to his lungs for observation. The procedure should take about 5-10 minutes. After signing the consent form, I waited back on the 3 rd floor at the waiting room with my parents for the doctor. The doctor didn't come down until 5:15 p.m.

The Pediatric Pulmonologist and the Nursery Pediatrician both explained to me and Hank (who's on speaker phone at work) about the findings. It seems like Logan has very floppy trachea and larynx, and his airway was narrow. They also saw some redness down on the right side of the bronchial tubes. They suspected that this might be due to acid reflux, which could be easily treated with medication. However, the floppiness and the airway would be a different story. We could either wait for Logan to get stronger and build stronger muscles to assist with the opening of the airway, or have a tracheostomy, which is a surgery that the doctors do not currently recommend. Logan's vocal cords seem to be fine anatomically, but sometimes they would either close or open for longer than they should. The doctor said that during the procedure when Logan was really upset, his vocal cords were close, thus he has his silent cries. The doctors were not sure the cause of the floppiness of his trachea and larynx and this is really frustrating. However, at least we finally found out something about Logan after the myriads of tests that were done on him. The Pulmonologist also reommended a test to look into Logan's GI tract to make sure everything was fine. This was a simple test where he had to drink some dye mixed into his bottle, and then get an x-ray to see where the dye went. He had this test done today and everything looked fine.

When heard about all this information, we couldn't really think of a lot of questions to ask. It was late and I was tired. Some of this information I didn't remember and couldn't understand it all. When I went to rounds today, I brought my notepad and wrote down everything (thus I was able to write what I have just written).

At this point, we will have to wait and see if Logan can get better by himself. All we could do is to feed him and make sure he gets stronger. We definitely do not want to bring him home with oxygen support, but keeping him in the hospital for months might not be the best solution either. Today, hiss oxygen level was between 25-35%, definitely better than the last two weeks. But was he able to go all the way down to 21% or with no support at all anytime soon?

Let's pray that Logan can get stronger and better soon. We would love to have him home for Christmas.