Still Worrying

6:52 PM Edit This 0 Comments »
And I can't stop!  Every time Layla gets too wild with her play I find myself asking her to tone it down!  She tripped over Aliyah today and fell and my heart nearly stopped!  I'm so concerned about this coil coming loose and the bleeding starting again.

Here is a picture of a coil being used to block off an aneurysm:
Typically they also put a stent in the artery to hold the coil in as well.  The neurosurgeon didn't want to do this because of her young age and the implications it could have for her down the road.


So what was done was that the doctor went through her femoral artery in her groin up to her internal carotid artery in her neck/ear out the hole of the artery into her ear then slowly backed up and placed these coils to block the hole.


Here is a simplified side view of the internal carotid in relationship to the rest of the head:


 See where the internal carotid artery curves towards the front of the head?  That's where it curves up and into the ear canal on Layla.  It also gives you some idea of where the blood is supplied by that vessel.  Pretty darn frightening!

She's back to her normal 3 yr old self and that makes it difficult.  I want her to be normal but I also don't want her to get hurt!  Discharge instructions from the doctor were to avoid activities that would dislodge the coil.  WTH?  I don't know what would do that but I guess they don't, either.  This is treatment into uncharted territory in a way.  She is one of five known cases in literature and apparently the others didn't need intervention or the artery was sacrificed.

So, loving that my Layla is back but worrying because of that, too.

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