Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Hannah's Rheumatology Check-up

Today we took Hannah to see Dr. Morris, her Rheumatologist, for a check-up. Currently she has to go every three months. We really like Dr. Morris and Hannah seems pretty comfortable with her. She lets her examine all her joints, check her heart, take her blood pressure, etc with no problem. She is such a big, brave girl!

Hannah has really seemed to be doing well over the last several months. She has only had a small flare-up (as we call it) last week when she had a little fever virus. She limped for a day or so, but then was fine. It was nothing compared to what she has experienced in the past. She is very active these days which is wonderful! Honestly, before we got on the methatrexate back in August she wasn't near as active. Now she runs, jumps, and climbs like a normal 3 year old!

Today, after examining her, she said Hannah had no active joints which means no swelling, tenderness, or warmth. She seemed to have full range of motion in all her joints, even her right wrist. This was the first time for this since we started seeing her. Yeah!!! When she examines her wrist, she moves it up and down. Previously when she'd do this, Hannah would guard against the movement probably because it was a little painful or uncomfortable. Dr. Morris said she could tell this because her elbow would kind of kick out. It did not do this at all today!

The one thing she did say was that Hannah's sed rate (click on it if you want to know what it is) was a little high last time. It was 38 and a normal rate for females is 20. She wants to see it come down. Her CRP marker was normal at 8. She said it typically comes down quicker than the sed rate. Hannah had her blood drawn again today. I called about it and the nurse told me that her sed rate today was 35. I guess I'm a little disappointed that it wasn't lower. She said she was a little anemic and her platelet count was up. This could be because she was sick with a virus about a week ago. She hasn't been eating very well lately either. She said Dr. Morris would probably look at the results tomorrow and she would let us know if she wanted to make any changes to anything.

I am so thankful that she seems to be doing better! We just have to keep praying for continued improvement.

I read something interesting in the "Kids Get Arthritis Too" publication that the Arthritis Foundation puts out. The government released an estimate of the number of kids with arthritis. There are an estimated 294,000 children and teens under 18 with doctor-diagnosed arthritis. There was also a state-by-state breakdown. Arkansas had 2,700 cases. Here are a few other interesting states:

California - 38,000
Florida - 15,800
Illinois - 13,100
Michigan - 10,300
New York - 18,400
Ohio - 11,500
Pennsylvania - 11,500
Texas - 24,900

On a lighter note, Hannah likes to sit up on the kitchen counter next to me when I cook breakfast in the mornings. The other day after breakfast she went back and played in her room with her kitchen for a while. She came up to me and told me that her baby was sitting on the counter. She wanted me to come see. Isn't she just precious?

2 comments:

JoEllyn said...

That is SO cute! So sweet how they imitate. We have been missing you on Wednesday mornings! Glad to hear that Hannah is doing better!

Jennifer said...

Jamie, I am so glad to hear about the appointment. How encouraging! She is amazing me with how well she is doing with the doctors these days. What an answer to prayers.