An ER Visit for Rachel

A couple weeks ago, right before Thanksgiving break, Rachel got sick... it started as a normal cold but by the Saturday after Thanksgiving she sprouted a fever and some breathing troubles. This isn't anything new for her. She usually gets fevers with infections. By Sunday she seemed better and on Monday she acted fine and even ate all of her lunch before going down for her nap. About 30 minutes in to her nap, she woke up crying. The kind of cry she gets when she has a bowel movement. Sure enough, she had one. I cleaned her up and she had another one. I cleaned her up and she just kept crying. After about 15 minutes she started to shiver and then I knew something serious was going on.

I ended up taking her to the ER. On the drive there she was scary looking, very pale and breathing shallow. I was afraid she was going to pass out in the car. As soon as we walked in to the ER and sat down, she vomited all over me about 3 times. We were rushed back in to the triage room. Her fever was 104.8 and her O2 Sat was in the 80's. She just looked BAD. The doctor in the ER had her chest X-rayed and we were told she had pneumonia. Rachel was admitted and spent the next two nights in the hospital.

After we were sent home with antibiotics and albuteral treatments, her breathing never really got better. I took her to the doctor twice more and we ended up being referred to a pediatric pulmonologist. Because of Rachel's history of needing oral steroids and antibiotics several times last year and so far three times this year, the pulmonologist decided that we needed to try a daily nebulized cortico steroid. This is to help Rachel ward off the inflammation that her lungs seem to have whenever she gets a virus. I guess we shouldn't be too surprised since Stephen and I both deal with asthma.We hope that the inhaled steroid will keep Rachel from getting as sick as she did over Thanksgiving. We just started treatment yesterday. I will update and let everyone know how it is helping her.