Surgery Scheduled

Clare's dental surgery is scheduled for February 23, which is perfect. It gives me more than a week to get all my ducks in a row plus it's over school vacation week, so Clare will not miss any school. Clare is only in a half-day morning program so between the Williams syndrome clinic, snow days, and snow delays (kindergarten is cancelled completely when there is a delay), she has already missed so much school over the past few weeks. Yet the surgery is not so far out that my days of freaking out over whether the "bubble" in her tooth has popped and is releasing dangerous bacteria into her bloodstream and potentially her heart is down to only a *short* 11 days.

I will take Clare down to Boston on February 16 to do her pre-op day. This will give us the opportunity to meet with the team involved in the surgery and go over everything. I have been impressed so far with how on top of everything they are (as they should be, but you never know!). The surgical coordinator and I talked yesterday on the phone (about an hour after she called me with the surgery date), and she had already spoken with Clare's cardiologist, pediatrician, and nephrologist to get the approval from them to proceed with surgery. She only needed me to sign a release with the endocrinologist before they would release any information. (Which took me about three minutes thanks to fax machines!) Everyone has given the thumbs up and is on board, so we are ready to go. I will get to talk with cardiac anesthesia on the 16th, but we have dealt with them (too) many times over the past six years, so I know they are usually well-familiar with WS and the associated anesthesia risks.

Clare will have to stay overnight on the cardiac floor following the procedure just to be on the safe side. She has had issues with anesthesia in the past (abnormal rhythms, cardioversions, blood pressure swings), but she was undergoing a catheterization each time, so the doctors were actually in her blood vessels and heart. When she had her fistula surgery eighteen months ago, she did great during the six-hour surgery with anesthesia. She had a lot of trouble post-surgery from the effects of so much anesthesia, though - high fever, vomiting, general yuckiness. The dentist assured me that this was a straightforward procedure, however, and Clare should not be under anesthesia that long. Hopefully an hour tops. So her recovery from the anesthesia should not be as bad. But I am glad they are keeping her overnight so the cardiac nurses and cardiologists can keep an eye on Clare post-surgery. If all goes as planned, she will be discharged the next morning.

I have our childcare lined up, and we are ready to go! Thankfully Clare is only in pain when we go near the tooth, so we are avoiding brushing that part of her mouth until after the surgery. Shawn and Clare are heading down to Kentucky on the Monday and Tuesday prior to her surgery to meet with Dr. Mervis, one of the WS experts in this country. So it's going to be a busy couple of weeks for Clare. Unfortunately, school break is not going to be so relaxing for her!