Sunday June 11, 2011

Sunday June 11, 2011

 

Ajay had a good nights sleep, and awoke with a smile and appetite :) He continues to amaze me and gives us such a reason to be happy. He is such a good boy, communicating his every need with sign language. It really helps the frustration and language barrier as well as the ability to meet his needs. He loves being in the car, which is a good thing considering we drive alot of places when we are home. The doctors we will be visiting will be quite a drive as well.

 

Today is a big medical day. We have the medical evaluation, TB test as well as the processing of his papers to be filed within the govenment in preparation for his visa. We met the driver and guide who walked with us to the Medical Center a few blocks away. Its a nice day, very humid, around 95% at 830am. Paul and I are sweating like crazy, and the guide is telling us its a nice "cool" morning.

 

The medical doctor spoke English which was nice, and easy to communicate with during the medical exam. Ears, nose, throat, and TB test went well. He listened to his heart and said said he definitely could hear the irregular heart beating fast as well as the mumurs. I thought he would say more, but I wasn't sure he knew that we knew how bad his heart really is. We do know, so I guess it doesn't matter what the doctor said, I was just curious if he would say anything further. He didn't. He did, however, see a nickel sized bump on the back inner portion of his left calf. Ajay has had some mosquito bites since we met him in Beijing over a week ago, and seemed somewhat allergic to them. He had some previous bruising and swelling on his face and arms were reddened from scratching it, but nothing further. Well, this bite became infected with just  a clear liquid when the doctor squeezed and poked at it. He wasn't allarmed, but did prescribed some antibiotic ointment and anti-itch ointment. No big deal....we went on our way, walking around some other stores and restuarants, throughout the area and returned after lunch for a rest. (Ajay gets really tired easily, so we take naps :) or at least try to and take it easy.

 

We woke shortly early that evening and took a nice cool bath after dinner. (Ajay LOVES the bath by the way and we played for almost an hour!) I was drying him off when I noticed his left leg was really inflammed and swollen. We got his pj's on and the more I looked at his leg, the more swollen I realized it had become. He was complaining of not wanting his shoes on earlier in the day, and was not thinking that his foot may have been swollen...at any rate, his entire left leg from the knee down to his foot was double the size of his other leg. The area was more red and mottled in color and he was itching it like crazy. I told Paul to run down to the Medical Center to see if by chance they would still be there. It was already 8pm at night and it was closed. I didn't think we should wait, because of the amount of swelling in such a short amount of time. We were at the Medical Exam this am, not more than 7 hours earlier...this was swelling quickly and I was afraid that the infection had spread. Having a little medical backround, I knew that an infection can easily spread to the heart. As we all know, Ajay has a heart condition...I was worried that the infection could make him very ill if we didn't get him oral meds. So no one spoke English at our hotel, as the typical staff had left for the evening. We called our guide and thankfully she suggested we go to the hotel nearby, where there is a medical doctor on staff 24/7. We walked to the hotel, and a lady at the business office spoke some English. We showed her Ajay's leg and she took us immediately to the hotel doctor office. We were on our own after that, but were somehow able to convey to the 2 Chinese ladies that we had a problem. I showed her the ointment, and compared his two legs, showing her the bug bite area. She said, "ohhhh" and wrote a prescription for oral antibiotic 4 times a day for the next 4 days. Luckily, it was strawberry flavored so he would take it better.  It was quite scary, being in a forgein country trying to find a doctor for a medically fragile baby who has a pretty bad infection.

 

The next day, we went to see the Safari Park in Guangzhou, and I put the medication on the area with a bandaid to keep the area clean being at the zoo and all...well, that didn't prove to be a good decision. It started draining liquid during the walk through the park, and I had no idea what to do. I didn't want to take off the bandaid with potential for more germs to get in, but it was starting to blister and drain. Luckily, our guide agreed that we should go, and get into a cool bath to calm down the inflammation, take off the bandaid, and let the air dry it up. AND at the sametime, keep him from itching it and keep still :) Okay, first things first...home and a cool bath...went well, and then cleaned the area with sterile q-tips we purchased on the way home, with peroxide, applied ointment and held his foot and him away from the area. Needless to say, it was bothering him and he was not happy with the "keep still" part of the evening, but we did the best we could. He never cried or fussed much when we got the meds on his leg, it over the course of the night calmed down some.

 

Thank God...again, no fever or any other symptoms of illness...just a horriblly swollen infected leg.