My Journal - Week 28 (01Mar10) Afternoon

The kid's got heart!

Today was Hunter's six month heart specialist checkup appointment.  And it was great. 

A little history for those who don't know what I am talking about.  When Hunter was born, it was discovered that he had a heart defect, as 40-60% of babies with Down syndrome do.  The kind of defect he has is called an ASD (Atrial Septal Defect) or otherwise known as a hole in the heart.  (Click the highlighted words for different links.)  When we learned about his ASD, we were told that it was fairly large, (8mm) but that many ASD's spontaneously closed on their own.  We also learned that he also had an unassociated heart defect, called a Bicuspid valve, (two flaps in the valve instead of three).  We were told that the valve was not an issue, and would not cause him problems until maybe much later in life.  At that time, if something is needed, it can be looked after. 
When I learned about these things from the cardiac specialist, I immediately went home to research these defects.  I learned that a medium to large ASD, usually required surgery, (albeit a very common surgery) because they tended not to close spontaneously as quick or as well as smaller ASD's.  Our doctor said that if things didn't close up on their own, Hunter might need a heart surgery before 3 years of age.  We were given another appointment and told that for the moment, the doctor wanted to observe the condition.

This brings us to today.  Hunter had his heart ultrasound and we learned that his hole has significantly closed, so much so that the cardiac specialist didn't even need to measure it.  He guessed that it was now nearly 2mm.  (Almost gone.)  He told us that this was a huge unexpected change and that it was great.  He presumes Hunter will not need surgery.  Yeah!!  Daddy and I were so pleased, and couldn't be happier.  A good sign of future things to come.  Thank goodness.

Comments

  1. Thanks for sharing the good news! I'm so happy to heard that the hole is closing on its own.
    You are very blessed!

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