11.29.02 Chelsie had another good day with her making some positive movements when we asked her to. We took her for a ride in her wheel chair around the fourth floor and parked her in front of a window for her first view outside in a very long time. She did get casts put back on her lower legs to help straighten her ankles some morebed rail with her left arm like she is going to use it to sit up.
11.28.02 Chelsie had a good Thanksgiving. Her family made dinner and brought to the hospital so everyone could be together to give thanks. She is grabbing the bed rail with her left arm like she is going to use it to sit up. She is doing real good at coughing by herself.
11.27.02 A major change for Chelsie: she is totally FREE from the trach. They actually put her in a wheel chair and took her to the physical therapy room for treatments today, not just in her room. The doctors gave a report of a 4 to 6 week stay in Children's Hospital. All is subject to change depending on her progress. She told mom "no" today.
11.26.02 Evening Update Chelsie has had a very big day. She got her trach capped/plugged and a few hours later she spoke her first words in over 30 days. She said "Momma" twice in a row. She also got some botox injections in one arm and both legs to relax her muscles. They believe she has an infection from her port she had in her shoulder earlier. They have her on some antibiotics for it. They also got her out of bed and into a wheel chair for almost 2 hours today.
11.26.02 Morning Update The doctors have down-sized Chelsie's trach this morning. They will check her this afternoon to see if they can plug it or not. They also just removed her casts from her lower legs, and they did some measurements to see if the casts have worked and if they had done their job of correcting her ankles. They will put some more casts on later to further correct her ankles. We (Chelsie's parents) have a 10:00 AM meeting with the doctors to go over her progress so far and what they expect for her in the near future.
11.25.02 Chelsie is moving her arms quite a bit more and moving her legs also. When she moves her leg it looks like sometimes she is mouthing to us to take her cast off. The doctors are going to down size her trach tomorrow.
11.24.02 Chelsie has a new bed that rotates her and then they can set it to vibrate from the waist up so that her lungs will clear up from the congestion. She is responding more to different commands like blink your eyes if you are in pain, raise your hand to tell someone bye. Sometimes she will even move her mouth trying to tell us something when we ask her a question.
11.23.02 Chelsie started on a stimulant drug last night.
Her eyes have been opening more often, so we think it's working.
She has some of her clothes from home with her and she seems excited.
11.22.02 Chelsie got blue casts put on her feet today. They go up almost to her knees. Hopefully they will stretch the muscle in the back of her leg by the ankle, so it will allow her heel to lay flat on the floor and not stand on the ball of her feet. She continues to have physical and speech therapy.
11.21.02 Chelsie is having speech theapy believe it or not and she's still in a coma. She responded better today than she did yesterday whenthe therapist was flexing her lip and inner mouth muscles. Physical therapy put her on a tilt top table and made her stand up. She wouldn't put her heelflat on the board, so that is a point to work on. They have stopped the continuous tube feeding ahd are putting her on a routine of every four hours,she'll get all of her meals at once.
11.20.02 A lot of people have asked about the scale of Chelsie's coma. This website will explain it. She has made it to level 2 of 8, with some parts of level 3 starting to show up on her. Level 2 is Generalized response: Patient reacts inconsistently and non-purposefully to stimuli in a nonspectic, stereotyped manner and may include physiological changes, decorticate or decerebrate movement patterns, and vocalization, at first only deep pain. View the web site link to see her next level we are looking for. She is opening her eyes even more today and has had lots of therapy today.
11.19.02 Chelsie has been moved to:
Arkansas Children's Hospital
800 Marshall Street
Little Rock, AR 72202
Attn Chelsie McManus
Room 4722
11.17.02 Chelsie is opening her eyes even more today and has even started swallowing. She started to cough mucas out of her lungs on her own today which is great news. She may be moved to Arkansas Children's Hospital Rehab any day now, maybe even on Monday.
11.15.02 Chelsie is off of the oxygen and continues to do well. She has a little bit of fever today. They are checking her blood to see if she has an infection somewhere or if it is strictly the brain injury. Chelsie is so blessed to have friends that care. :)
11.13.02 Chelsie has had a productive day of therapy 30 minutes this morning and an hour of sitting in a chair this afternoon. She has been off of the vent all day long and continues to keep her vital signs good with just the oxygen cup on.
11.12.02 Chelsie is having longer therapy sessions; she is sitting in a chair at least 30 minutes twice a day. Sometimes her blood pressure goes up or down while she is sitting up, but once she relaxes, it comes back to normal without any medication. Her temperature has been up again today. The doctors are not sure if there is an infection some place or if it is just caused by her head injury. She continues to hold on and fight to come out of the coma.
11.11.02 Monday Morning: Chelsie is doing about the same.
Her vitals are still going strong. She's still opening her eyes partially and moving her arms and legs each time we visit. She even yawned yesterday!
11.08.02 Chelsie had a very good day with only a few small
seizures. She had good vitals all day and only one shot for pain. She did open her eyes several times, and we even put her glasses on her for a few minutes. She is improving a little each day now, but has a long road ahead. Chelsie is still in a coma and breathing with a ventilator, so please continue to pray for her