During Baby C’s 3-week stay in the hospital recently, she had gone through many types of scans from countless x-rays to a Fluoroscopy, ultrasound scans, a CT Scan and even an Echo Heart Scan!  That explains how our bill amounted to over RM50k!   During that period of time, I cannot tell you how terribly worried I was of the amount of radiation my little baby’s body was exposed to everyday.  But it’s between the devil and the deep blue sea.   X-ray or you won’t know what’s going on inside her abdomen and guts.  It’s a case of do or die.  During the fluoroscopy procedure, my heart pounded each time I saw the Radiologist taking pictures of Baby’s abdomen… all in, there were easily 20-30 pictures!  That procedure only completed about 4 hours later.   Not to mention the 3 days straight in a row of x-rays taken (including one done on one night towards midnight) to rule out obstruction of the guts when she puked non-stop.   Anyway, sigh…. all is over now, I hope.

During the 3-week nightmarish hospital stay, when all the x-rays and scans did not give a conclusive and definite answer, a group of paeds came to see Baby.  The chief paed did not want to leave any stones unturned and sent her for an Echo Heart Scan to rule out Kawasaki…. though she did not have other Kawasaki symptoms. The cardiologist from another hospital was called to perform the Echo Heart Scan on Baby. The scan showed a slight dilation of the heart vessel but that did not warrant any serious attention. The report showed that all was normal but to monitor Baby’s condition.

Days later after all those scans and x-rays, when Baby’s belly ballooned up like an inflated balloon, our surgeon ordered Baby to be operated on immediately and I was given a notice of like less than an hour to be mentally prepared!  That day – 22 May 2009 will forever be etched in my memory.  Not a day goes by without me reminiscing of what Baby and I had gone through during her 3-week nightmarish stay in the hospital. It was like living hell for Baby and I pray that Baby never ever have to re-live those days again, ever.