Yearly Check-up - 8 years

Today was Dylan's annual check-up with his cardiologist. He did his EKG, then did an ECHO. It's nice that he's old enough now that trips like this don't phase him. That was definitely not the case when he was younger! 

Turns out, he's doing great! There is not a very big change with his heart from last year to this year, which is good news. The biggest concern remains that his pulmonary valve doesn't close, so it allows a back flow of blood every time his heart pumps. This creates mild-medium dilation in his right lower pumping chamber, as well as mild dilation in his upper right chamber. His aorta is also slightly dilated. There's also a small hole between his upper chambers, which is pretty common in people that have this heart defect. 

The difference between this visit and many that we've had before is that the doctor started talking to us about the future. Dylan's doing fine right now, which is great. She's not going to keep him from playing soccer or running on the playground. But a valve replacement is in Dylan's future. So next summer we will go up to Seattle Children's to have an MRI done. This will surely be a challenge for Dylan to lay completely still for at least 45 minutes in a long tube, but we will cross that bridge when it comes. This MRI will give us an even clearer picture of what is happening inside Dylan's heart, and it will give us a good baseline to compare future tests to. He will also be doing an exercise test in the next year or two, when his legs are long enough to pedal the stationary bike that they do the test on. 

So nothing is changing for him at this point, but we are gathering more information for the inevitable changes and surgery in his future. We're so grateful for his wonderful cardiologist! 

Dylan was happy to have this cute girl come along today.

Here's to one more year of growing and playing and just living worry free!