ER?! Thought we were done!

Carter is proud of his tiger gown he had to put on at the ER!


We had a great day with the boys on Saturday. All five of us went to Fashion Island and walked around. The boys loved watching the fish in the koi pond and having lunch. Then, that evening Carter became very cuddly. By the time we were putting pjs on him and getting him ready for bed, he felt a little warm. Sure enough, he had a slight fever. The temperature was not in our crucial “monitoring phase”, but Matt and I knew it was coming soon. At midnight, Carter woke up crying and his temperature was 100.5. If his fever remained in this monitoring phase for over 4 hours, we’d have to call the doctors. Carter was up every hour and finally he and Matt went to sleep in the office.

At 8am on Sunday, we called CHOC and the oncologist told us to give him one dosage of Tylenol. If Carter’s fever then came back, we were to call him. After we gave him the Tylenol, Carter asked to go to bed. He slept a lot of the morning. Around 4pm, his temperature went to 101.5. We called UCLA and CHOC and the oncologist said we needed to take him to the ER. We explained his central line was removed and we do not have the risk of a line infection. Also, we told the doctor (who we had never met and was unfamiliar with Carter) that Bennett had a virus the week prior. Finally, we agreed to bring him in to the ER to get blood cultures as long as they would then send us home. If something was to come of the cultures, they could then have us admitted to CHOC. We told him Carter would eat and drink more and be more active if we were home.

Well, once we got to the ER I felt terrible for Carter that I had agreed to this. They had to give him another IV in his arm (third one this week in his little bruised veins). They did the nasal suction, drew blood, bagged him for a urine sample, took his vitals every hour, paraded us through the ER to go get a chest x-ray, and multiple other tests. Matt and I think that since this oncologist was unfamiliar with Carter, they error on the conservative side. We had more tests done at this ER visit than any other visit in the past. Finally, they gave him some Tylenol so his fever could go down. And they also wanted to send us home with Tamiflu, just in case it’s the flu.

As I was lying with Carter on the gurney cuddling him, my eyes filled with tears. I am so proud of him for being such a strong and courageous boy. And I’m so sorry he’s had to endure so much in these innocent toddler years. Clearly, he had finally had enough too. After being so sweet to all the nurses all night and calling them by name, he made Matt and me laugh as our nurse walked into the room. Carter sat up and looked down at his IV (which was no longer pumping antibiotics through him), and said, “TAKE THIS OFF, LADY!” She knew he was done with this, and within 5-10 minutes we were headed home. We finally got home at about 10:30pm, and Carter could at last get some rest in his own bed.

He woke up feeling great this morning, and hasn’t had a fever since. I called CHOC to see if we have a new protocol now when Carter gets a fever. It seems ridiculous that we’d have to go to the ER every time. I said that we have preschool years ahead, and I’m sure tons of fevers in our future. She said we’ll have to call each time and the doctor on call would make that decision. It’s just frustrating because we are being treated at two different hospitals, so CHOC and UCLA will always have us go in to protect themselves. Hopefully, this won’t be the protocol months and years from now.

We have to go to CHOC tomorrow for an oncologist to take a look at Carter and give us the results from the ER tests. We will also find out tomorrow if we are still able to go ahead with Carter’s surgery on Wednesday, or if we’ll have to wait. We could go either way. We're anxious to get it done, but understand Carter needing a break too.