Last week I was in the hospital for my appendix, Thursday Ichiro’s Jeep broke down on his way home from work, and this morning I had to take little Koji to the hospital!
Koji woke up early this morning. I could tell he wasn’t himself. I tried giving him his pacifier and he just kept spitting it out. When I picked him up I realized he was so warm. It was very clear he had a temp. Ichiro ran downstairs for the thermometer and it was 102.5. The pediatrician’s office wasn’t open yet, so the emergency operator told us to bring him to the ER.
Ichiro stayed home from work with Noby, while I jumped in the car and rushed Koji to the ER. What an awful experience! The nurses and doctors were great but you just feel so bad with all the tests they have to do on your poor little baby. The doctor explained that with infants you run lots of tests and use the data to determine why the fever happened in the first place.
The first test was for urine. They had to insert a tiny little catheter to collect the sample. After they had to insert an IV into his hand. This would be used to draw blood and give fluids if he needed them. It was hard to watch, especially when the nurse missed the first time and he had to call an expert to do it again. After this they moved us from the ER into the pediatric section. The doctor came in and explained that next they needed to get spinal fluid to test for meningitis. This broke my heart all over again! A spinal tap?!?! She explain that the risks were so low in infants that anything would go wrong because of where they draw the fluid. So they attempt the spinal tap, TWICE and of course they didn’t get any fluids. She said it could be either that he moved or he was dehydrated. They decided before they tried the spinal tap again they would give him some IV fluids. In the meantime Koji’s pediatrician called and we decided to not try the spinal tap again. Since we had arrived at the ER, Koji’s temperature had gone down. Our pediatrician thought it would be ok to watch how he did over night. IF at any point during the night we were concern, if his temperature returned, if he developed a rash or if he acted a little funny we were to bring him back. At that point they would attempt to do the spinal tap again. If he did fine during the night, we just had to bring him to the pediatrician’s office in the morning. I agreed to this because I wasn’t sure I could sit there while they tried to do another spinal tap again. By 2:30, when we were sent home, Koji was doing so much better!
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