2/4-2/5/12 - What a weekend...

For those who aren't aware of the what the CVL line (central line) that's in her chest is, let me explain.  When she was diagnosed, they surgically implanted a CVL line, or a central line, in her chest like the diagram below:

The line goes into her body and through one of the veins near her heart.  The connections at the end, or the line caps as I call them, connected to the line allow easier access and a non painful way for blood draws, to receive chemo treatments,antibiotics, and other medications, and to receive blood products when needed.  Where the CVL enters/exits her body, she has a dressing to cover the site to minimize the chance of infection.  It consists of a Biopatch directly covering the entrance/exit site then a bigger transparent covering over that, protecting everything.  The Biopatch has antibiotics in itself and is good for 7 days, making the change process occur less often, as it is uncomfortable and can be painful from time to time since the skin underneath can be irritated sometimes. 

The wee hours of Saturday morning some of the roughest we've had since diagnosis.  Haylee was beside herself crying because the central line dressing was itching so bad.  When the irritation got bad before, we eliminated the Tegaderm dressing cover and it seems to be doing better.  I had to change the dressing 3 days early because she had been itching and messing with it that the dressing was coming off and the Biopatch started slipping under the dressing.  She was screaming and crying and was getting no relief from anything that had worked before.  I stayed up with her in her room where we finally passed out from exhaustion at 2:30am only to wake back up at 3:15am and start all over again.  She finally passed out for good about 3:45am and slept until about 9am.  I took her down to Egleston to get it checked out and to see what they could and what we could do differently from here on out. 
We elminated the Chloraprep cleaning solution and changed it to Betadine instead and covered the dressing with gauze as well as a different transparent dressing to see if that helps.  She was literally screaming and crying in the ER because it was itching so bad.  She ended up making herself go into an anxiety attack, I guess you would say.  She started getting flushed and almost breaking out in hives on her arms and legs.  They gave her prescription Benadryl through her central line to calm her down and help with the itching and hives.  After about 15 minutes, she was fine and the itching was at a minimum.  We left there with a new way to change her dressing and a prescription antihistimine to use instead of OTC stuff.  Dr. Abdella happened to be the oncologist on-call and spoke with the ER doctor about Haylee.  She told them she would put in a call to the dermatology department to see what else can be done.  Haylee ended up falling asleep in the car on our way home - probably a cross between lack of sleep and that good Benadryl!  She ended up sleeping until abou 9am Sunday morning, which is sleeping in for her.  Her line site has been doing good since Saturday afternoon.

Haylee goes back to school on Monday and she is so excited!!!!  I'm going back to work as well, but only during the time she's in school.  Have a great SuperBowl Sunday!!