Level II ultrasound at Hartford Hospital

Today was our final level II ultrasound.

As we were waiting to be called into the U/S appt, there was another woman waiting with us. We started chatting. I could have sworn she was having twins but I didn’t ask. Turns out she was just having a rough pregnancy – diabetes before she got pregnant and now she is up to 4 shots of insulin a day!  Thank GOD I didn’t open my mouth and insert my foot!

I was really impressed with the office today – when we checked in they told us they were running a half hour late. At least we knew … and it turned out we only waited 15 minutes.

Sandra was the u/s technician. There was also a med student who asked to be present. Considering how “interesting” our case is, I really didn’t have the heart to turn her away.

Olivia looks FANTASTIC! She weighs 6 lbs, 12 oz already! They expect her to be about 8 lbs+ at delivery!

The doctor we saw was Dr. Borgida – he was the doctor we saw for our first u/s AFTER we found out. He was wonderful back then and was amazing today. We got some amazing views of Olivia’s heart and nothing’s changed. IMO, he spent a good amount of time on her heart because of the med student but I was happy to see it is still growing – even though it’s still F’ed up

He told us that he doesn’t believe Olivia has craniostenotosis (or whatever it’s called). Her head isn’t perfectly round but he said it normally would be VERY severe at this point and she’s not there.

I could have cried and hugged him at the same time. I kept thinking “I love this man!”

I requested they check my BP as my OB forgot this week – it was 92/70 and the woman who took it couldn’t believe it. “Perfect BP … I’m shocked! Especially for sitting up!”

Today’s appointment was JUST what I needed. Arnie and I went to lunch after (had time to kill before our 2pm tour of the PICU) and I kept saying to him that I felt like running around the parking lot with my arms raised screaming “WOOOOOOHHHHOOOOOOOO”. The “head thing” was really bothering me deep down. I’m so relieved!!!

We met with Denise (technician) and Dr. Feldman. Olivia’s legs are measuring 34 weeks. Her arms were around 31+ weeks. They estimate her weight to be around 4lbs, 3 oz.

Dr. Feldman is concerned about Olivia’s head which looked slightly abnormal. Possible early bone fusion – temples may be pushed in slightly. The name of the disorder is craniosynostosis (sp). Dr. Feldman said it may be nothing – could be something we wouldn’t even notice. But most importantly, it’s not serious and is 100% correctable. Just something new to add to the list.

Dr. Feldman recommended that we start doing NonStress Tests (NST) weekly. She was concerned about the swelling in my feet and called Dr. Cortland to give her a heads up.

We ran into Dr. Heller (Olivia’s cardiologist) on the way out – she was coming in. She is just so nice and it’s so reassuring to see her.

I am scheduled for one more appointment with the Maternal Fetal Medicine Group on July 1 at 2:30pm.

Diana was the technician and then Dr. Bobrowski and Dr. Heller (Olivia’s Pediatric Cardiologist – PC) attended.

Olivia is measuring in the 70th percentile (up from the 50th last week). They have her at 29-30 weeks based on her measurements.

We saw the following:

• There was a “nice arch in the aorta”. The PC was thrilled by that.
• Olivia’s ribs are growing and making the U/S’s more complicated in the sense of we have to work harder to avoid the shadows.
• The Main Valve is still not leaking which is AWESOME.
• Kidneys and stomach are where they should be and look good. Gallbladder is definitely on the wrong side but looks good otherwise.

Olivia was all over the place. At one point her feet were way up near my ribs. Then she was in a jack knife position which made for some fun in attempting to get a good scan of the heart.

Dr. Heller was surprised that the smaller portion of Olivia’s heart has continued to grow which makes us believe her VSD (hole) has not closed. It’s not a bad or good thing – just not what they had expected to see at this point.

We talked to Dr. Heller regarding Arnie’s concerns about Olivia possibly having aspleenia or polyspeenia. He’s been really worked up about it – reading horror stories on the Internet. She feels that this is a minor problem and not worth going through a Fetal MRI to determine. We’ll know “soon enough” and they will be evaluating her anyway. Arnie’s feeling much better after talking about this more with her.

We talked about possible induction dates and they told us to talk to Dr. Cortland about a July 19th induction date.