Fuse

That's a lot of hardware!

Christian is almost 24 hours into this journey.  After a LONG day at the hospital with little to no information since his initial surgery last night (actually early this morning, as he went into surgery around Midnight and came out around 1:45am) we're on to phase II.  First though, we had a phase Ia.  This morning they placed a filter at the entrance to Chris's heart to catch any blood clots from getting to his heart and lungs.  Spinal injury patients are at high risk for blood clots since they are lying flat and moving little if any.  Along with this filter device they placed a feeding tube in Christian's nose, since getting food down your throat side by side with a breathing tube can be a bit difficult to say the least!  After that procedure the on-duty nurse gave him a full bath and general clean-up to make him as comfortable as possible.  We want to thank all of the doctors, nurses and other IHC staff who have worked on Christian so far, they've displayed the utmost professionalism and courtesy (except of course for the little "lack of information" issue named earlier, but we're over it).

Phase II...  Results from the MRI came back.  Long story short, there is visible damage to the spinal cord.  Whether this damage is completely permanent, partially permanent or not permanent at all is yet to be seen.  The vertebrae are in a good line as they're supposed to be and the spinal cord has room to breath.  Christian's Neurosurgeons are concerned that his C2 vertebrae is still very unstable due to the amount of soft tissue damage.  Normally the next step is to take an x-ray of the injury site while lying down, then another while sitting up, to see how they compare.  If things look good, the patient stays in the halo for 3 months +/- to allow the spine to re-fuse naturally, thus being stable again.  Unfortunately the surgeons are concerned that movement of any kind may cause the injured C2 to displace again and possibly cause further spinal cord damage.  With that said, the plan as of this evening is for the surgeons to fuse vertebrae C1 & C2 sometime tomorrow.  This is the most aggressive and stable approach, although it will limit his neck movement in the future.  The upside is that the halo/traction device can be removed and a neck brace worn in its place.  This will also allow for Chris to be moved around, sitting up, lying down, etc. without concern for C2 moving again.

As of now the concern over the air bubble in his abdomen has subsided, so we can say a prayer of thanks for that!

Chris has been sleeping most of the day, but is alert somewhat between naps.  He's communicating with blinks and smiles as best he can.  When asked if he wanted to see a picture of himself hooked up to every medical device ever invented, he gave the affirmative "toothy smile" as only a breathing tube down your throat allows :-).  The above photo was snapped from an iPhone and shown to Chris which produced another "toothy smile" :-).  Until tomorrow, we continue the journey!