Our journey out the door of the NICU took a detour yesterday. Unfortunately, Lucy needed to have surgery on her arm. She has been on blood thinner medication for the last three weeks for the blood clot that was found during an ultrasound. The medication can not be given through IV, only through a needle. Every four to five days, the doctors insert a catheter in her arm which can be reused every time she needs a needle. This way she only gets poked once in five days instead of twice a day. On Sunday, a catheter was removed from one arm and a new one was put in on the other. There was bleeding but the doctors thought everything was under control. On Tuesday, the site where the catheter came out of suddenly developed a large, dark, and swollen bruise. Everyone was surprised and the bruise was monitered. Yesterday morning, the black bruise had grown and the skin has broken open. There was a lot of pressure and it was decided that she needed surgery right away so that the skin did not break down any further.

This was a huge surprise for us and everything happened very quickly. The doctors were also surprised because they have never seen this happen before. The surgeons opened up the bruise, removed the blood clot, put a drain in, removed the dead tissue, and stiched her arm back up. Lucy had to be put back on the ventilator and into an isolette again. She is on IV antibiotics and morphine and off of her feeds. The doctors are optimistic that she will make a full recovery soon. Please pray that she does not get any new infections because of the surgery and that she recovers quickly.