She's Out!!

At 11:00 the vascular surgeon came out and said they were done. He did not make any attempts to sugarcoat how difficult this had been. He said that they originally thought that the clot in her leg originated from her heart, but found when they were operating that that was not the case. To have this make more sense, I'm going to give a very brief vascular anatomy lesson. Each leg has a large vein and a large artery that run through the groin. (if you put some pressure on the margin where your abdomen meets your leg, you should be able to feel a pulse--if you can't, please don't call me unless your foot is purple. Even if it is, call your doctor instead!). Central lines are placed in VEINS. What happened with Kim is that when she had her event on Tuesday she needed emergent large vessel access. Since her arms and chest have been ravaged by dialysis catheters, the groin was the next best place. With Kim's small size, the artery and vein lie especially close together, plus she has scar tissue that sandwiches things even more. When the doctor placed the Central line it completely penetrated THROUGH the artery and then cannulated into the vein. The catheter, therefore, partially interrupted the bloodflow through the artery to the lower leg and a blood clot formed. To fix this, they had to do a cut down to place a new Central line in her right groin, remove the damaged section of artery and connect the ends together, evacuate the clot, and form 3 small incisions to allow some of the swelling to weep out. The surgeon said that it was a VERY challenging surgery and if at any step along the way things did not go exactly as they did he would have felt that amputating her leg would have been the best option. We're all feeling that we truly saw the hand of God at work through this surgeon!
Kim returned to her room around midnight and Bob, Evelyn, Craig and I all saw her for a short time before leaving. Bob is spending the night in the hospital with her tonight.
Kim's social calendar for the rest of the night includes: a CT scan of the head and chest, about 50 billion more labs, turning every 2 hours, and trying to heal that ever-so-injured body.
Thanks for all the thoughts and prayers. It's 1:40 am. I haven't seen this time of day for a while and tomorrow is a new adventure. I asked Kim tonight to try to keep tomorrow a little less exciting. We're ready for a boring day!
Good Night~
M