Well...it has been quite a while
so I suppose we were due,
or quite possibly even overdue,
for a trip to the ER.
Thursday morning we were in the midst of what was predicted to be a full day of snowfall.
Audra was acting a little "off", hyper one minute and tearful the next.
Hyper describes her well most days, but tearful is definitely outside of the norm for her.
Eventually she came over to me holding her forehead,
I investigated for myself and felt one hot little head.
She had a temp of 103...
which isn't terrible {for her},
BUT she has not had a fever since she was diagnosed with the immunodeficiency (CVID) in November.
A call to the pediatrician resulted in what I was hoping not to hear...
"take her the ER".
So, next I called her Immunologist,
(hoping to hear that it wasn't necessary to take her to the ER),
only to be met with a confirmatory "take her to the ER".
I packed a bag,
cleared the snow off the car,
and we were off to the city, mid snow storm!
Lucky for us, a snowy day is a great day to visit the ER.
We were taken back to a room immediately after signing in!
4 hours later...
after vital signs, assessments, bloodwork, urine samples, a Flu test, an IV and an ultrasound we learned that she must be admitted.
Apparently when you have an immunodeficiency...
fever = admission for IV antibiotics
:(
She was a happy camper for her first big girl wheelchair ride...
The test for Flu and other respiratory viruses was negative,
and her bloodwork was not overly concerning,
but given her history of kidney reflux and 2 episodes of pyelonephritis
UTI was the most likely culprit.
Her urinalysis was inconclusive so we would need to wait for the results of the urine culture.
She was admitted to the same unit where she spent 2.5 weeks in May of 2013 (right after we brought her home). Her welcome board stated the simple but necessary goal for getting out of there....
no fevers!
Almost everyone we saw remembered Audra from May 2013...
nurses, doctors, the case manager, and the child life therapist.
We just love this unit!
And Audra has seen many different units in CHOP, so we speak from experience!
After a long day, she got tucked in for the night with her faithful friends:
Tubie and pink-flamingo-bunny
(and a new mermaid...her reward for being brave with all her "pokes" in the ER)
Her fevers started trending down fairly quickly after getting the IV antibiotics into her. And besides a little tummy trouble, she was looking pretty good by the next day.
Later in the afternoon her urine culture was final...NO infection.
So, the Immunologist came up with a fabulous plan...
they would give Audra an different IV antibiotic that would cover her for 24 hours (until the blood culture result was back) and we could go home and wait it out.
30 hours after showing up in the ER we were on our way home.
Shortest admission ever for Audra!
