Update on Emily

A week ago Monday, we went back to Dr. Vanderhooft at Primary Children's. I expressed to her my frustration with the lack of healing of one of the ulcers (the other one has healed well). It just keeps oozing and has a lot of dead tissue around it. She decided to change the dressing that we are using to Duoderm which is more debriding and to keep using the Biafene.

She also brought up doing steroid injections into the actual hemangioma. These are the most effective at shrinking the hemangioma while it is still growing (usually before 9 months). After explaining the risks and benefits, we decided to do them. She left the room and brought back with her about 5 people - residents, med students, etc. (gotta love a teaching hospital). She did 5 injections directly into the side of the hemangioma. Poor Emily - she absolutely screamed. Luckily my mom was with me so I didn't pass out or cry right along with her.

Dr. Vanderhooft said that Emily would be really sore for a few days. Well, sore and miserable she was. She pretty much cried and whined for three days. She didn't sleep well and we medicated her with Tylenol and Motrin the whole time. I told Dr. Gould about it and he said that it's probably really sore as well as the steroids making her really crabby.

It's been a week and I think that the hemangioma looks smaller. The ulcer looks nasty and awful but I thinks that because it is so raw with the dead tissue gone. She screams more than ever with dressing changes and is back to screaming when she hits the tub water. Poor girl... I feel like such a horrible mom for making her cry so hard. Hopefully she won't remember any of this. :-)