News about Liam

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August 13, 2007

Another Day. Another Setback. Another Disappointment.

Today at 2:00 Liam will be going back to the Operating Room (for a 3rd time) to fix an issue with his 'blood Flow' into the liver. Dr. Reyes has explained that Liam does not appear to be at risk for rejecting the new liver, in fact the liver is quite 'happy' with it's new home.

The problem with the flow is basically as follows:

The liver receives blood fro 2 sources: The Portal Vein and the Hypatic Artery. As you may recall, the second surgery was to fix a kink in the portal vein, caused by inflamation of the tissue and the liver. That being revised, we thought that the flow issues were fine, and our focus needed to be on alleviating the fluid build-up in his tissues (normal post surgery stuff). Unfortunately, the portal vein is working so well that it is not allowing any room for blood to flow from the hypatic artery. Basically, the Portal Vein is overpowering the hypatic artery and actually causing a back-flow of blood into that artery.

How do we fix this...Dr. Reyes will be completely closiong off the weakend hypatic artery and creating an Arterial Graft from the aorta directly into the liver, replacing the hypatic artery altogether. The hope is that the blood flow will then be equal from both sources. The Hypatic Artery is responsible to send blood to the bile ducts - without that nourishment, we could run into bile duct problems and the need for another transplant. But let's not even go there.

The surgery is expected to last for about 3-4 hours. I will update this web page once I have a better understanding about what is going on. For now, our prayers are simple...The Almighty Physician guide the hands, hearts and minds of Liam's surgeons; that Liam will not be anxious about anything; and that our family continues to be filled with this amazing peace which is beyond all understanding.

God's blessings on this moment.