Friday, August 29, 2008

What to do...

We got the ultrasound and Doppler results. Her spleen IS enlarged (no, duh) and is 8 cm, which according to the report, is 2 standard deviations above the upper end of normal. Not sure how much a standard deviation is though. I need to contact the hospital she was born at to get a copy of the original ultrasound report so the docs can compare the growth factor between then and now. There is NO portal vein hypertension, and her blood flow to/from the spleen looks normal. There is some slight restriction on her hepatic artery that is "nonspecific" but that doesn't seem to be a concern right now.

Also, Baby H's platelets are at 94, which is just 1 point higher than it was at the last visit on the 13th. But "at least it didn't go down!"

So, after talking to Dr. B, he wanted me to make an appointment with Dr. M, the hematologist, in two weeks and see him back in 4 weeks. The next day, Dr. M calls me with the results of the ultrasound not knowing that Dr. B had pulled them up the day before and let me know the results. He told me that he wants to see Baby H in SIX weeks and to follow up with Dr. B in 3 weeks. I called Dr. B back with that info, and Dr. B wasn't too pleased because he wants answers sooner than later because since we have ruled out almost all acute reasons for the enlarged spleen (infection, etc.,), he is concerned that it may be metabolic and require more invasive testing (like biopsies, etc.). But he agreed to go with the flow for now.

I called and made an appointment with Dr. M on 9/25 -- which will actually be the 4-week mark instead of 6-week mark. We'll see Dr. B the week before that just to get another platelet count to see if there is any change.

I have more to share (the fun stuff), but I'm exhausted! I'll be back later to share what has been going on with my THREE kids :)

4 comments:

Mrs. Spit said...

Ok, a standard deviation isn't a number as such. It's a measure of what is called Normal Distribution.

Remember those bell curves from school? A standard deviation tells you where you fall on the curve and how likely it is that you will be there.

So, if normal (or in this case average) is 5, then we would expect of a sample, that 68.2 percent of people would be within one standard deviation of normal, and 95% of people would be within 2 standard deviations of normal.

The problem is, based on the sample size and the values used, I can't tell you what numbers would be within one standard deviation and what numbers would be within two standard deviations. Unless I had a lot more background, I can't tell you what numbers would fit in there.

Really, standard deviation is a measure of how likely it is that you will find yourself on a particular point of a graph. What I can tell you, assuming that the curve uses normal distribution, is that it is likely that approximately 13.6% of babies will have a spleen size that is more or less the same size as your wee one.

Which really isn't that helpful. And I'm sorry. ((Hugs))

Kelley said...

Mrs. Spit is giving me flashbacks to college statistic courses, which is not a good thing for my nerves (though if she's not a teacher, she should be because she just explained in a way that I could halfway understand with my limited mathmatical/statistical aptitude!).

I'm sorry you still don't know anything definitive and that you're having the worry that comes with that. And good for you for your own scheduling ingeniuity.

Hugs to you AND your three kids. :)

Kelly said...

Hugs to you. I was hoping you'd get definitive answers sooner rather than later. I know it's got to be hard to hang in there. Hug all 3 kids for me and you'll be in my thoughts.

Ariel05 said...

I'm with Kelly - sorry you haven't gotten answers yet. You are always in my thoughts and prayers as well.