Ultrasound for Will

I feel like Will's blog is turning in to his medical chart...

We have an MRI scheduled for next Thursday, but I found out that it is only looking at Will's abdomen, back, and pelvic area. I had thought that his right leg would be included to find out more about the huge vein in his foot, but it was not on there. I called Dr. Thomas to see if he would add it. After explaining to his office staff a million times that I was aware that he was a urologist and could care less about feet, he was the one that scheduled the MRI initially and he knew about this foot problem. Sure enough he called me right back (as he always does) and said that he would be glad to add it, but he didn't really think an MRI of his leg was really the test that needed to be done. His nurse called back and said that radiology couldn't add it on because the dye that they use wouldn't last long enough to look at all of these areas.

So I called his pediatrician Dr. Huss. He agreed that the leg needed to be looked at because he has a knot in his calf (which JT has always noticed, I didn't really think it was a big deal until recently). Will has been acting like it hurts him when we touch it lately. Dr. Huss agreed that MRI of the leg probably wasn't necessary, but an ultrasound should show us what we want to see. Sounds good to me because we wouldn't have to put Will to sleep for that. His nurse got it scheduled for me right away.

We went for the ultrasound and Will of course screamed his head off the majority of the time. When the tech turned on the sound to listen to blood flow, it got Will's attention and he started "ooh"-ing (his new favorite sound to make). He even started watching the ultrasound screen and seemed interested. Other times he watched TV. The rest of time he screamed. The radiologist reviewed it immediately and the tech told us that we needed to go back to the lobby and wait for Dr. Huss to call us. I told her that he had my cell and could call me later. She said the radiologist was calling him now and we didn't need to leave. Of course this couldn't mean anything good! JT and I tried to laugh it off, but we both were not excited about staying any longer than we had too.

I got to talk to Dr. Huss just a few minutes later. He said the ultrasound wasn't showing enough and JT and I were right...we need an MRI of the leg. Good grief! It looks like a vein malformation, but they can't see where it ends. They need to make sure it doesn't end in the muscle. I have no idea what this means. The radiologist added it to next week's test so that we don't have to put him to sleep twice. Wait a minute - how can they add it to the test when I was told that they couldn't do that just a few days before??? Dr. Huss said the radiologist said the test would take longer obviously, but there would be no issues with the anesthesia or the dye. Hmmm, I think that nurse lied to me. Oh well, we have a plan now and that is all that matters.

The plan: Thursday, Sept 6th
We will go for the MRI in the morning. Will is going to be put to sleep for it because he has to be perfectly still and there is no way that would happen otherwise! It will probably take a few hours. We are looking at the hemangioma (strawberry) on his back, fluid pockets in his abdomen, soft tissue and large veins in his pelvic area, and his calf to see if this vein is problematic.

I don't want anyone to get the wrong impression - Will is doing great!!! He is growing and developing just as he should. These are just all things that need to be checked out. Best case scenario is they tell us he will grow out of all of it without any interventions. If that is the case, I'll be sorry that we put him through all of this, but would be glad for no more procedures!