Sarah’s bp rose back up again today. Blood tests as of 6pm showed her organs are still doing fine. We spoke with several different doctors today and we pretty much have a good understanding of everything that’s going on so I’ll try to give everyone a run down:

Sarah has preeclampsia which is a disease that affects the mother (can also have affects on the babies too). High blood pressure, swelling, and protein in the urine are common symptoms. The only cure is delivery, however they try to ease the progress with bedrest. The problem is not necessarily the high blood pressure itself, but other problems associated with the disease (organ problems, seizures, stroke). So they use the symptoms as a guide to judge the severity and at some point decide to deliver. When they will make this decision is not predictable.

Twin B (the girl) has a placental deficincy which is causing slow growth (IUGR). As of Thurday (January 12th) she measured around 400 grams (21.5 weeks in age). Twin A (the boy) on the other hand measured 562 grams (around 23.5 weeks in age). They also measured blood flow using Doppler ultrasound and found the umbilical cord blood flow for the girl to be abnormal (most likely the reason for the slow growth). Also, they noted an increase in blood flow to her brain. We are told they do this as a survival mechanism to get enough oxygen and nutrients to the brain. Unfortunatley it could mean there is not enough blood going to the rest of her body meaning growth will be even more compromised and there is a potential for damage.

So what does it all mean? Well first of all the statistics show that for survival of premature babies the birth weight cutoff is about 500 gram (this is roughly 1.1 lbs). The girl is just to small to have much chance of survival at this point, however, the boy is above the cutoff. Still being born at their current size will mean a very long stay in the NICU and bumpy road ahead to say the least. The deciding factor at this point is the preeclampsia. We’re crossing our fingers that we can hold off the preeclampsia long enough for the girl to get up above the 500 gram cutoff.

So what are they doing now?
Sarah has been given steroids as a precautionary measure. The steriods are used to strengthen the babies lungs and they take 48 hours to take full effect. Again it is a precautionary measure just incase the preeclampsia takes a turn for the worse. She is on oxygen 24/7 to give more oxygen to the baby girl in hopes she can grow. She is on hospital bedrest and we are now told she is likely to stay at the Kaiser Marriot Resort for the duration. Luckily the hospital is literaly 5 blocks from our house so I’m able to go home every now and then.

So we’re just trying to hang on as long as possible to let these little guys get bigger.