Echo

And the cycle of doctors visits continue...

Today we went with both girls to the cardiologist for repeat echos (heart ultrasound) to check if the hole between the two chambers of the heart is still there annnnnnd (drum roll please).......... it is, in both cases!!

However the cardiologist said it was nothing to worry about, the chances are still very good that it will close itself in the next few months as the girls are only 2 and a half months-corrected age. She also said even if it doesn't close, approximately 10% of the population is walking around with this and don't even know it. The only times it becomes medically relevent is if we have a history of clotting disorders (we don't) or if the girls want to go diving (not this year).

Other than that the hearts look really healthy-even Enya's showed no signs of the extra strain placed on it by the 2 months where she still had the PDA. In the last week we have also had a few alarms on Enya's monitor due to a low heart rate (under 80bpm) when she is sleeping. When I mentioned this to the doc this morning the immediate reaction was the alarm limit is set too high and we must reduce it to 70. Unfortunately we can't change the settings on the monitor so it will have to wait until next week when we have the monitor downloaded. At least now when I read low heart rate alarm, I don't need to panic!

The best news is we don't have to go back until the girls are in kindergarten. Even then it is just a check so we can warn the girls later that they have this condition should they want to go deep sea diving.

Other news: last night was one of the worst nights for sleeping in a long time. Enya's monitor kept beeping but none of the alarms were real. An electrode had some how become detached and was sticking to her vest and so the monitor kept showing apnoea or unable to read the heart rate. I wasn't prepared to wake her up to undress her and stick new electrodes on so at 3 am I landed up turning off the monitor. She woke an hour later for her feed so it is not as if she was long without the monitor. Besides during the day we hardly ever put the monitor on as it is so sensitive to movement that it alarms continuously when Enya is awake- she is a little wriggle bottom, just like her big sister.