Good News!

Small piece of news before we move to the big news... we found out last week that Katie's creatinine was back down to 4.6 and that made her happy, but it wasn't a dramatic enough drop to cause any change to our course.

We were out of town for the weekend and came home to a message from one of the donor coordinators that my blood work results were back. So I spent all day today trying to get in touch with her and finally succeeded at around 4pm this afternoon. The news is ALL good: we have the same blood type, our bloods mixed together well, and the cross match came back with a 4 out of 6 match. Typically parents are a 3 out of 6 match to their children, so we're better than average. So we have the go ahead to continue with the rest of my workup.

The timing ended up working out very well because we see Dr. Mendley tomorrow. Katie and I need to have blood drawn and having it drawn at the hospital is just a little better than an outside lab. They apparently have to take quite a bit from me but the donor coordinator says I will be able to go on living after the volume they're going to take.. seriously, that's what she said. Katie just needs one vial drawn and it is for UNOS purposes (United Network for Organ Sharing). They are ready to list Katie on the UNOS list so that her time could start running if she should need a cadaveric kidney. Your position on the UNOS list for a kidney transplant is completely based on the length of time you have been on the list so just in case a family or friend donor doesn't work out they want to list her now. UNOS requires monthly blood work so this will be the start of that, and we will do that until her surgery is done.

So, you may be wondering where we go from here. I have to have a full medical workup to make sure I'm healthy enough for surgery. On Thursday, September 18th I will spend the day at the hospital. I meet with a bunch of people, a social worker, the donor coordinator, the donor surgeon, and an adult nephrologist. And I have several tests, an EKG, a chest x-ray, and what's called a CT angiogram which is a specialized CT scan done with contrast so they can see how my renal anatomy is layed out. As long as there aren't any problems with any of those results we go forward.

Katie also has to have more testing done which we hope to start scheduling tomorrow, she also will need an EKG and an echocardiogram. She has to see her pediatrician for a tetanus shot, and she needs a renal ultrasound and a visit with her regular surgeon.

So that's where we are... any questions, ask away.