Kayden's Big Heart

We got in to Primary's on October 6th which was amazing!! First off our growing boy has something called valvular aortic stenosis, which is a narrowing around the entrance to the aorta.




The black part that is labeled 1. and circled is where that narrowing is and basically cuts the valve in half so the pressure is really high until it starts to get bigger then the pressure is low.





Second our sweet Kayden has another issue but since Puchalski has only seen me once now and has not taken any ultrasounds on his heart before, he couldn't exactly tell what the problem is however he did give us a best and worse case scenario. Best case is something called coarctation of the aorta.



So as you can see in the picture, the arch spot is narrowed and this is a "simple" procedure (I don't know what heart surgery is simple but hey, it's always a good thing to hear when your doctor says it). Survival rates are high with this surgery and our doctor was optimistic that this was the main problem with his heart.



However, third, he was very straight forward with us, which we appreciated, and told us another possibility could be something called hypoplastic left heart syndrome (the worse case scenario).




So this occurs during the heart's development, parts of the left side of the heart (mitral valve, left ventricle aortic valve, and aorta) do not develop completely. The left side of the heart is unable to send enough blood to the body.




So there is the long update of his heart. I am 24 weeks and for now see some docter (between my EIRMC specialist that comes up from the U, my regular OB here in Rexburg, and Dr. Puchalski down in Salt Lake) every week or every other week depending on schedules. We'll be going back down to Primary's Nov. 3 to get a tour of the ICU as well as meet our surgen and get a few more ultrasounds.

Thanks again for all your support, prayers, phone calls, texts, cookies, baskets of goodies, visits, and great talks. We love you!