Owen's EGD

Owen had an EGD (scope of his esophagus and stomach) done on Monday morning, as well as a 24 hour pH study. This was to check for damage due to reflux or allergies. The pH study was to measure the pH of his esophagus over a 24 hour period, which would show us how much he is refluxing. Well, that was the intent anyway...

Isn't he cute in his hospital gown? Waiting to be taken back for the procedure was the hardest part. No, actually, the pH test was the hardest part. I'll get to that in a minute... At the hospital, waiting for the procedure to start was the hardest part. Sitting calmly on the bed lasted for about 2.5 seconds.

Oh, this is fun to climb on! Why did the nurses put a "fall risk" bracelet on me, Daddy?


Dad, I'm tired of sitting.
I will wrestle my way out of your lap...

Here is how he looked after the ride home! The pH study involved having a tube down his nose into his esophagus. The tube was connected to a sensor box that we had to carry around with him all day. The white arm band is to keep him from pulling out the tube. Owen couldn't crawl or play or do anything except whine with the arm bands on, so we took the left one off for a while. He left his nose totally alone, so we thought he had forgotten about it. Well, he quickly pulled out the tube while I was changing his diaper. I was not watching his hand closely enough...

We went back to the hospital (20 min. drive) to have it re-inserted, which was not fun for Owen. Then they had to do an x-ray to make sure it was in the right place. After we had been home again for a while, I noticed that the pH reading was staying down too low. We called the GI doctor and confirmed with him that something was not right. So, Jordan loaded up Owen in the van and headed back to the hospital. They gave him a new tube and a new sensor box. The nurse wanted to extend the test because of our gap in data with the sensor malfunctioning. Jordan and I were quite frustrated at this point, but thought we better keep going... The new sensor was put in at 7:00 p.m., and this lasted until 4:00 a.m. when Owen somehow coughed out the tube while in bed (he was sleeping with both arm bands on!) so we had to declare the test done and pull out the tube.

Tomorrow we will find out if they got enough usable data... they may want us to re-do the test. At this point, that is not an option that we really want to think about!

To be continued...