Yesterday afternoon, it looked like Charlize would have been taken off her respirator since all signs indicated that she would be able to breathe on her own. They had taken her off of 2 other drugs and she responded well. However, before we left the hospital last night, the ICU Doctor decided it would be better to wait until this morning due to the fact that the shift change was going to happen soon and the staff would be reduced. So, they re-started the drugs and left it up to today.
This morning, we found out that there were a number of emergencies last night with other patients which meant nothing was done with Charlize. Not a problem. Better to be prepared. Chantale’s early morning report indicated that she had some liquid in her chest (left side) and they were working on getting that cleared up.
I got to the hospital at 2pm with Kyle to bring Chantale some food and as we walked in there the doctor’s were taking her off the Pacemaker! Although this morning’s verification found that her underlying pulse was at 79 (good news on its own for the cardiologist who thought it was a full blockage even though we had already been told yesterday that it wasn’t full blockage -another case of left hand/ right hand syndrome), when the CVT and Cardiologist Resident came by this afternoon she noticed (as Chantale pointed out to her) that the rhythm on the monitor looked different. Sure enough, the ICU Doc came over and they found a strong pulse. He switched off the Pacemaker and her little heart kicked right in! It kept beating at 143 on her own! He configured the PM as a backup to automatically kick in at 125 in the event she can’t sustain it, but it was incredibly encouraging news! The Doc and the Resident were both ecstatic, again claiming how she’s handling all this like a true champion! Not even 48 hours after her surgery!!
That’s today’s very happy news 🙂 When Chantale gets home tonight maybe she’ll have more to add 🙂