Ella's fevers

* Ella has a temperature chart in her Caring for Your Child with Cancer binder which tells us when to continue checking her temp every 30-60 min. and when to Call Now! Around Oct 30th her temp started creeping into the "check every 30-60 min area" for the first time since we've been on this road (we routinely check her temp every morning and evening per Dr's orders) Checking and waiting for something to happen is not easy on a mother's heart.

* On Oct 31st Greg was oncall and woke in the night with fever and chills. We decided to have him sleep at a hotel or at his parents until Wed when he'd been fever free for 24hrs. He then reentered the house wearing a mask for the short time Ella and I were home before leaving to go to Chemo (Greg stayed home with Bini, as sick people should not hang out in Heme/Onc clinics) On Wed night Ella spiked a fever and we ended up in the ER, but Greg wore a mask. On Thursday he gave himself a rapid strep test which came back positive and he again stayed at his parents until he'd been on antibiotics for over 24hrs.

* On Wed Nov 4th Ella and I went to chemo (wore masks while in the clinic) but her Dr's weren't concerned about her low grade temps. Less than an hr after getting home Ella had a fever of 103.2 and we were off to the ER. Thankfully this time we were able to go to the hospital 5 minutes from our house and they took us straight back to a private room. The nurse we had had worked at Children's up to a few months ago and was great at accessing Ella's port and being patient with a screaming, feisty child (The fever work up in the ER consists of accessing Ella's port for labs and blood cultures, chest X-ray, and a flu swab. It takes at least 2 adults to hold her down for anything invasive). Ella's flu swab on Wed came back negative as did everything else. They gave her a dose of antibiotics and monitored her blood pressure for an hour to make sure her it didn't plummet as apparently could happen if she had an infection in her blood.

* Sunday Nov 8th Ella's fever at bed time was the call now temp (101). But, knowing that if I called they would make us go to the ER. I rechecked her temp ever 15 min for 2 hrs before it crept up to 101.3 and I made the call that sent us to the ER again. (When we got to the ER her temp was only 100.4 so I called the Oncology fellow at children's again to see if we could just go home, but he told us to stay for the work up. With every tear from Ella I felt so bad thinking we didn't really need to be there.) Same fever work up but this time the flu swab came back positive for influenza A, H1N1. And her temp climbed to 102 while we were in the ER. Greg was on call on that night and stuck in the OR but when cases finished he was able to join us in the ER. The ER dr wanted to admit us but thankfully the Oncologist said we could go home.

* Ella has no symptoms of the flu, no cold symptoms, just fevers. Praise God!

* We started her on Tamiflu which gave her massive GI upset and a rash all over her body. We have therefore stopped the Tamiflu after day 5 instead of going with the full 10 day course given to high risk kids.

* This Wed we went to Chemo and Ella was not looking her best. She'd slept 14 hrs the night before and still fell asleep on my lap while waiting for the Dr. We asked them to give her IV fluids (all the sleeping=no drinking) and to do blood cultures again so we wouldn't end up back in the ER that night. They did, and her temp did spike before leaving the clinic.

* Thankfully she hasn't had any fevers since Wed. Even though they know she'll have fevers with the flu we would still need to get blood cultures done to make sure she doesn't have an infection in her port.

* Please pray that she will sleep better as she's been crying out in her sleep the last few night (no fevers) perhaps nightmares?

* We are so grateful to our friends, Craig on Wed and Johannas and Erin on Sunday, who at a moments notice came over to sit with sleeping Biniyam until the wee hours of the night So that we could bring Ella to the ER.