Visit with the Cardiologist

Dylan went for two full months without seeing any doctors! It was wonderful to end the summer that way - completely normal.

Dylan went in to have a check up with his cardiologist last week and we had some interesting findings. He went through an ECHO (which is essentially an ultrasound of his heart) which meant that I had to keep him still-ish for over 45 minutes while the technician tried to get the images he needed amid Dylan wiggling and trying to eat the ultrasound probe. It is getting harder to do this the older Dylan gets! But luckily he was happy for the entire ordeal, just super wiggly. 

The cardiologist took a look at the ECHO and said that overall she is happy with how his heart looks. The hole that was patched up has a small leak at the bottom of the patch. It will probably never heal on its own, but it shouldn't get any bigger. In addition, the blood that is flowing through the pulmonary artery is going a little bit fast and there is an extra volume of blood passing through that area because he has blood that flows backwards every time the heart pumps. His heart still has to work harder than a normal heart to do its job. Despite these things, the right side of his heart is not dilating or getting bigger, which is a good thing. None of these things are reasons to go back into surgery, which we are relieved by. For now he is dealing with it just fine and so they will continue to keep an eye on his heart during periodic visits. 

The thing that was a bit more troubling was that he is not growing any faster than he was before his heart surgery. Even when they correct for his prematurity, he is still below all of the charts in his growth. We are not sure what to think of this, and we hope that it is just Dylan taking his own time to grow at his own rate and not a sign of something else. We will be going in to see his pediatrician in two days and will get his take on Dylan's growth. We are hoping for good news!

Dylan is just a laid back, smiley baby and we love him so much. Just check out this smile!