12/9 Bronch Update

An update regarding Josiah's bronch this morning...s

ome good news, some not-so-good news.

Josiah was especially anxious about his bronch and being put to sleep this morning...we and the medical staff agree he's probably just getting more and more tired of being here and having things done to him.

The bronch was relatively quick. For those of you who don't know, a bronch gives his doctors an opporunity to check on the condition of his airway.

First, the good news. His doctors still think it will be o.k. for Josiah to leave the hospital tomorrow and move to RMH with Shelly and me. RMH is literally across the street from our hospital, and they want us to stay close. His discharge tomorrow will also depend somewhat on how today and tonight go, but we expect to move to RMH tomorrow. For Josiah, it will be a welcome change of scenery, new activities/surroundings/opportunities to play...for us it will mean more consistent rest. Good news all the way around.

The not-so-good news: His airway does not look as good as we were hoping. We've included a photo taken this morning (we have others but this one seems to best show the important issue)...basically, the white tissue on the top and bottom of the picture (in reality, where his anterior and posterior grafts were done in his airway) represent the grafts done during his surgery 2 weeks ago. The pink tissue is mucosa, which is the lining which produces mucous. What we were hoping to see was very little (if any) white tissue, and mostly (or all) pink tissue, which would mean the airway is healing well. However, as you can see, there's still a lot of white tissue. They said this helps explain the breathing issues he had at end of last week, and just means the healing is not progressing as quickly as we'd hoped. Hopefully we haven't grossed anyone out, but we're including the picture to give you an idea of specifically what you can pray for: We want the pink tissue to cover/replace the white tissue!
The doctors also advised us that it's very unlikely Josiah will go home on the 17th as was the original plan. He will have his next bronch on Wed., 12/16 as originally scheduled, but it likely will not be his last before we leave Cincinnati. The doctors said we should expect to continue to be here and have weekly bronchs so they can monitor his airway's healing. Whether that means an extra week or possibly longer remains to be seen...however, at this point it appears likely we'll spend Christmas in Cincinnati. But, as one of his nurses pointed out this morning, Santa Claus visits Cincinnati, too!

We're still processing this news that wasn't quite what we'd hoped and there's some degree of disappointment, but we're o.k. We are excited about moving Josiah to RMH, and we have full confidence in his medical team here at Cincinnati Children's Hospital (may your children never have serious health issues, but if they do it's hard to imagine a better place for them to come than this hospital...it's earned "5 stars" from Snead's Hospital Touring Service). In addition, the longer we are here the more reminders we see of how much for which we have to be thankful, as other families and children face circumstances which appear less hopeful than ours. We're waiting to see how God works out the details for our upcoming travel to Rwanda to pick up our 2 new additions, as it looks like that will occur in January...but He already knows how that will work out.

Thanks for checking, and remember: Think (and pray) Pink!!!