Pleasantly Surprised

I took Sweety to Primary Children's Hospital last Friday for more tests. Yes, we now know that he has an IGF deficiency, but they're looking for some more specific info and ruling out some other stuff.

In an attempt to delay the torture, we started with X-rays, the reason for journeying to Primary Children's. When we last had Sweety's bone-age done, our local hospital merely took pictures of one hand, which is apparently not fully accurate for children under two yrs old. The hope was, if we go to a Children's Hospital, they'd better understand how to capture his bone-age.

Much to my disappointment, the technician took pictures of Sweety's hand again. I expressed my concern, but he didn't know anything else to do. He checked with his supervisor, and then took pictures of Sweety's individual fingers. I figured I'd just have to call the endo myself, find out exactly what he wanted, and come back again.

We then moved on to the blood work.

Sweety hasn't had good experiences in the past, so I was ready for some misery. I warned the phlebotomist, that Sweety has taken down the best of the best at our hospital, and was probably a hard stick. I was glad when she asked why he was so difficult and where we'd had success. She carefully looked him over and made a surprising decision.

The largest, and closest to the surface, vein Sweety has is buried in rolls of fat in the bend of his wrist. This rather intimidating location didn't frighted her. She called in reinforcements, (3 other people!) and with absolutely no hic-ups, managed to draw all the needed blood on the first try!

Sweety calmed down in no time; I think he was in shock that it was over so quickly. I however, was nearly in tears! I took some self-restraint, but I managed to not jump in the phlebotomist's lap and kiss her on the mouth!

Then as we were heading out the door, we were called back to X-ray. While we were in blood work, the X-ray people called our endo and found that we needed pictures of the whole left side of Sweety's body. Apparently no one ever needs a bone age on kids as young as Sweety, (I always knew my baby was special) so X- ray techs don't know that's required. I am so glad that they were willing to double check, solely on my recommendation, and save me the time and bother of coming back again!

Click, click, click, a few more pictures, and we were on our way home! Thanks Primary Children's for listening to this Mom with no medical credentials. Our experience was remarkably satisfying; our drive was definitely worth it!