NIH Day 3

We packed up our things from the Children’s Inn and were over to the NIH Clinical Center by 10am for Jane’s pre-operative chest x-ray and her semiannual echocardiogram.  Then our afternoon took off! Between 12:30pm and 5:30pm Jane had a pre-operative anesthesia consult, another MRI, and we met in-person with no less than TEN different doctors who will be involved in her care tomorrow.  We met:

#1, 2, 3  The pediatric oncology attending who will be watching over Jane post-operatively, and two of her fellows,

# 4, 5, 6  The urologic oncologic surgeon performing the main part of Jane’s surgery, and his fellow and resident,

#7, 8  The neurosurgeon who will be removing the tumor itself, and his fellow,

#9  The neurologist who will be intra-operatively monitoring the function of Jane’s nerve as the tumor is removed from it (to make sure that it is not injured),

#10  The plastic surgeon who is removing a more superficial tumor from Jane’s skin at the same time. 

My head was swimming.

Our home for the next several days

We learned today that the plan is for Jane to be admitted to the ICU for at least 24 hours postoperatively, which I confess sounds a little scary but we’ve been assured that it is just a precaution.  Jane was disappointed to learn that she was only allowed clear liquids for dinner tonight, but she gamely ordered chicken broth, strawberry jello, apple juice and a cherry popsicle.

Dinner

During a lighter moment this afternoon, one of the pediatric fellows described to Jane a type of medication she had to drink this evening in preparation for her surgery.  He said “It’s odorless and tasteless,” to which Jane responded, “Oh, is it iocaine?”  The fellow chuckled, so we knew he was a good guy (since he got her Princess Bride reference!)

Jane will have another IV placed at 6am tomorrow, then we’ll be brought to the surgical area by 7am for an 8am surgery start.  We’ve been told the average for this type of procedure is 5 hours in the operating room, so it will be a long day.  We’re going to get to sleep early tonight.