Brooke's Heart

When we were in Almaty and Brooke was checked out by the SOS clinic, the doctor there heard something with Brooke's heart and told us to "just check with your doctor". The day we got home with Brooke (13.5 months ago), my cousin (a physician's assistant) checked Brooke out and heard a murmur in her heart. The next day, we had our appointment with our primary care physician (PCP). She also heard the murmur. A year ago, we were doing EKGs, echos and meeting with cardiologists -- Brooke has VSD; a hole in her heart.

The good part (if there is a good part to having a hole in your heart) is that she showed no signs of it; meaning it wasn't affecting her. She was active; it wasn't slowing her down. The typical protocol is to meet every 6 months to check in. So in July 2009, we had our 6 month check in. The left side of her heart was slightly enlarged because it was working harder (than normal) to pump more blood because of the hole. The cardiologist said that she has a 50% chance of the hole closing on its own and that if in 6 - 12 months it hasn't closed, we need to look into other options.

At Brooke's 2 year check up last month, our PCP could not hear the murmur. A week later, on Christmas day, I had my cousin check Brooke and she couldn't hear it either. For this past month, we've been anxiously waiting for Brooke's scheduled cardiologist appointment... not really talking about it (in hope of not jinxing ourselves), wondering why our PCP and cousin couldn't hear it anymore, trying so hard to not play the "what if" game.

Today was the cardiologist appointment. Scott had to take Jack to his speech therapy, so I took Brooke to the appointment; did the echo with her, did the EKG with her, sat with the cardiologist. She did amazingly well with the echo; sat still eating cheerios the whole time. She didn't like the EKG, blood pressure and oxygen test on her finger; cried almost the whole time. She had no problem with the cardiologist examining her.

And after all that.... the hole in her heart has gone from "small" to "tiny"!!! And that is should be closed in 6 to 12 months! The cardiologist said that his job is now to monitor the closing to ensure nothing goes wrong while it is closing!!

He did say it was "intriguing" that she has these reoccurring fevers but didn't see anything on the echo to think her heart has an infection that could cause the fevers. But we'll do a chest x-ray a few weeks before her next appointment in July to see if that shows anything that could connect the fevers to the heart. But if the fevers don't come back and if the heart is closing, she is all good!