08h24
Gabriel spent the night with his Aunt Perla.
He’s doing well. He woke up at 4:50 this morning and went back to sleep soon after. Last night, he cried a lot, then calmed down. His saturation was between 97 and 100%.
18h29
Its oxygen saturation ranges from 92% to 100%.
This morning, for the first time in over two months, the doctor told us about a possible discharge from UTI, if her condition remains stable over the next few days. It’s an encouraging prospect!
A quick reminder: this weekend, two days after his extubation, Gabriel developed a fever. Daily blood tests, including CRP (C-Reactive Protein), showed rapidly increasing inflammation. Fortunately, yesterday, the results began to improve.
On the first day of fever, the doctors performed a blood culture (a blood test to detect bacteria). The results, which take around five days, arrived today. They revealed the presence of Klebsiella pneumoniae, a multi-resistant bacterium typical of hospital environments.
Note that this bacterium was already present in her trachea a month ago, but had not infected her (this is known as colonization).
This evening, the doctor explained to us that there’s a good chance that the infection originated from the PICC, the central line they removed yesterday. It’s possible that silent colonization took place on the PICC, and that when the body showed signs of weakness (extubation, inflammation), the bacteria passed into the bloodstream and then came to squat on the PICC, because these little bugs like to squat on tubes and things like that. Once they’ve squatted, they create a kind of biofilm to protect themselves. This could explain why the PICC became blocked (pure theory).
Fortunately, the doctors had anticipated this and started preventive treatment on Sunday with meropenem, a broad-spectrum antibiotic. This treatment certainly helped contain the infection, which explains the improvement in the blood results yesterday. But we’ll have to keep an eye on the situation, as this evening, Gabriel’s fever rose to 37.8°C, a sign that will be closely monitored over the coming hours.
A more personal note
I think we were sorely lacking in information at the maternity hospital.
For example, nobody told us that we were in the middle of a bronchiolitis epidemic, even though the hospital 2 km away was in absolute emergency with numerous cases.
That’s why I’ve decided to write an article to share what we’ve learned. There are simple gestures and precautions to take, but we still need to tell you about them…
Here’s the link if you’re interested: https: //hopeforgabriel.com/bronchiolite-comment-la-prevenir-et-proteger-votre-bebe/
