Page 14 - Journey of Hope by Raymond Moldenhauer

and stabilized at Christiana Hospital before they would move
her. The Surgeon explained the procedure to all of us and
assured us once again that this was not uncommon and that he
had performed this procedure many times on premature babies.
The "unknown" going in was "where in the intestine, how many
ruptures, and how bad was/were the perforations"? The
procedure itself was expected to take only about 45 minutes.
He also explained what they were planning to do once they
determined the extent of the damage.

At 5:00 we were allowed to see her (2 at a time) before they
would take her to the OR. She was still very alert - a very tough
little girl! At 5:30 PM they wheeled her past us. Now we could
only wait and pray.

At 6:30 they notified the NICU charge nurse that the procedure
was done and had gone very well. There was only a small
perforation in the lower portion of the intestine (very positive
since the upper intestine is where most of the nourishment is
extracted for the body). So they only had to remove a very small
piece of the intestine - no future problems anticipated as a
result. The 2 disjoined sections of the intestine where pulled
through an opening in her abdomen. The flesh around the new
opening was stitched tight. This will remain that way now until
she grows and gets her weight up to 2000 grams (unfortunately,
she only weighs 740 grams now) or 5 pounds. At that time, they
will join the intestinal sections together once again and reinsert
them into her body cavity.

They currently plan to keep Alyssa at the Dupont NICU now
rather than sending her back to Christiana. The Physicians,
Practitioners, Nurses all seem to be very knowledgeable,
competent, friendly and helpful. Since this NICU specializes in
the care of surgical infants, the nurse to infant ratio is higher
than at Christiana - so we know that Alyssa will be getting super
care.

We all left the NICU around 10:30 PM tonight once again praising
God and thanking him for answered prayer.