Tuesday Update: 09/12/06

I just wanted to post a quick update after our trip to Iowa City. Today we met with 4 different doctors…and it was a looonngg day (left at 6:00 AM…home at 5:30 PM). The first half of the day was spent with the Ophthalmologists, discussing the problems Matt has with his eyes. They worked him over with a battery of tests and exercises, but he was a trooper through it all, as always! What we found out is that Matt’s eyes have remained stable, and that the only real option we have to help improve the double vision and misalignment is surgery. Matt’s hemorrhage has caused multiple issues with the way his eyes move, focus, and work together. The goal of surgery will be to reduce the double vision as much as possible, and hopefully align his eyes together. The doctor explained that it could take more than one surgery to completely get rid of the double vision…but we all agreed to give it a shot and we have scheduled his surgery for next Thursday, September 21st.

This afternoon we visited briefly with the doctor who assisted with Matt’s embolization procedure and the neurosurgeon who oversees them. They both wanted to get an idea of how things were going with Matt’s rehab, to be sure there weren’t any negative results from the embolization. They were pleased to hear how well things went for him in Omaha. They also want to see Matt back again for another angiogram, to check the AVF and see how things look. We know there are a couple tiny veins that were too small to embolize back in June, and they want to check their status. We hope that they have closed themselves off and the AVF is completely blocked off. However, if the veins have increased in size, we’ll likely have to pursue another embolization. So, we have scheduled the follow up angiogram for October 9th.

So, there’s a lot to be praying for in the coming weeks. We pray Matt’s eye surgery goes well next Thursday, and that the angiogram shows the AVF has been closed off completely. In the meantime we keep on keeping on…always looking forward to the many possibilities which lay ahead.

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