Just thought I'd put in a quick update about Paige's PDA ligation surgery. She had a good night and was stable, but the NICU thought it would be best to do the surgery in the NICU rather than in a surgery room, so the surgery room was brought to Paige (sorry, didn't take any pictures).
The surgery went well and Paige appears to be comfy on an IV painkiller called fentanyl. Read the post on Day 5 for an in-depth discussion of what a PDA is if you have forgotten. The surgeon said that Paige's PDA was nearly as big as her aorta, which is pretty darn big. I guess that helps explain why her lungs have been so wet and she has been having such a hard time with her oxygenation. Her blood gases were better after surgery than I have ever seen them.
Due to the anatomical location of the PDA, one potential complication with PDA surgery is "temporary" vocal cord paralysis (up to a year). Another is permanent vocal cord damage, causing a person to have a lifelong raspy voice. A raspy voice is a small price to pay for a correctly functioning circulatory system, but hopefully she doesn't have these problems. I guess we'll know in a year or so.
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