12 month check-up

Alexis had her 12 month check-up a couple of weeks ago. It wasn't the best check-up she's had, and since then, things have been incredibly stressful. First, she is only 30.25 inches and 19 lbs. 15.5 oz. That puts her in the 85th percentile for height and the 30th percentile for weight, which doesn't seem that bad, but she's only grown 3/4" in the last three months and gained 4 oz. The doctor was concerned, but since she was so big before he thought that maybe this was just a bump in the road. We then told him that she's been throwing up, just about once a day for the last two weeks. It's not much, and it doesn't seem to bother her, but it keeps happening. The doctor seemed even more concerned about that and wanted to keep an eye on her.

Alexis playing with some new friends, before her 12 month check-up.

I don't know why it didn't occur to me until the next morning, but those two things, along with the excessive amounts of water she seems to drink, seemed eerily like what happened to me when I my kidney failed, as a kid. I called the doctor and he was very concerned. He said this new information "changed everything", and he wanted to run some blood and urine. That was on a Friday, so we scheduled the blood work on Monday. It was AWFUL! It took several tries to hit a vein, and then they didn't get enough blood and had to get more from the other arm. The lab also said they didn't have the order for the urine, so we went to the pediatrician's office and had them attach a urine bag. Unfortunately, it fell off and Daddy and Alexis had to go back the next day.

Then, on Wednesday, I got a call from the doctor's office. They said they had some abnormal results, and the doctor wanted us in right away to redo them. When we got there, the doctor told us that Alexis' bi-carb levels were at an 11. I'm not exactly sure what that means, but it has something to do with the level of acid in the blood. The doctor said that he was upset with the lab, because they didn't call when they got the results, and an 11 is at an emergency level. He said he wanted to see her, though, because kids with that kind of bi-carb level usually appear quite ill, and Alexis does not. He said he wanted to redo the blood, just to make sure that it wasn't a fluke. He said if the results came back the same, we'd be going to the hospital that night and meeting with a pediatric nephrologist. They redid the blood work that day, which was even worse than the previous visit.

Alexis getting ready to go back to the doctor.

The on-call doctor called us later that night and said that Alexis' levels had improved to a 19. He said that was still well below what they like to see, but it took her out of the emergency range. He said that he had spoken with our pediatrician and they both agreed that we did not need to go to the hospital that night, but thought it was important to talk with the nephrologist.

We got a call from the pediatrician the next day, he said that the nephrologist did not seem overly concerned, but he did want to schedule a renal ultrasound. We're going in for that tomorrow.

Alexis has been such a little trooper, and we're holding out hope that this is all just an unfortunate coincidence.