The Posse

Dr Leber and his merry men (and women)

C.S. Mott Children's Hospital is part of the University of Michigan Health System...a teaching hospital.  We discovered what that truly meant on Monday morning April 8th around 10 am.  A knock on the door woke us all up from an early morning nap. (Oliver had realized at about 5 am that he was not in his own bed and he was NOT a fan....)  On the other side of that knock was a group of about 12 Doctors- interns, residents, fellows and an attending- plus a nurse or two.  I'm fairly certain they threw around the terms opsoclonus (eye movement) and myoclonus(muscle jerks) and ataxia (loss of coordination) as early as that first morning of rounds, however at that point it was more in the way of describing the symptoms than a diagnosis.  Dr Leber (the attending, i.e. the man in charge and also the on-call neurologist who had been consulted on Sunday evening) had spoken with an expert in opsoclonus from LA who was advising him on the eye movements.  They also tossed around words like neuroblastoma, listeria, encephalitis, and meningitis... we still felt a sense of peace, but those are big scary words to report to the anxious grandparents. 

A full body MRI was first on the list of "next steps".  This would further rule out a mass that might have been missed by the CT scan on Sunday night.  Because of the number of departments that needed to be coordinated and the length of time needed to complete a head to toe MRI, it was scheduled for Tuesday.  So, Monday was spent waiting around and receiving IV antibiotics due to elevated white blood cells in his CSF (cerebral spinal fluid).  Oliver was still up for playing and in a pretty good mood...Nana, Mimi and Papa Ernie all came up for a visit and stayed for dinner. Oliver enjoyed them but was, as described by his specialist last week, a velcro child.  He stuck to me almost around the clock.  

We also found out that we would be inpatient until at least Thursday afternoon since that was the day he would have the MIBG  (no, that does not stand for Men in Black (rated) G, but thinking that sure did help me remember what that stupid test was called)....more on the MIBG later.