Wednesday, March 30, 2011

A Trip to Children's Mercy

We took Evelyn to see a pediatric gastroenterologist and Children's Mercy yesterday.  There is something really weird about seeing your child with a hospital bracelet on.  Disconcerting to say the least.

Anyway, it went well.  I was super nervous about it because I don't like having to take my kids to the doctor. 

She looked at Evelyn's growth charts, pictures of her belly after she eats gluten, pictures of her rashes, her allergy results, and genetic tests.  She concluded that Evelyn probably does indeed have Celiac disease. 

I say probably because there are only a few ways to confirm it 100%.  The best way to test for it is to eat gluten for 6-8 weeks on a daily basis, be put under general anesthesia, and have a biopsy of your small intestine taken out.  When Evelyn eats gluten she's a mess.  Horrible, painful, blistering rash.  No sleep.  Extremely agitated by life.  Potty accidents all over the house.  Anyone want to sign their 2-year-old up for that?  No thanks.

The doctor is going to check with the head of dermatology at the hospital though to see if we could just biopsy her rash to get a for sure answer.  That would mean having her eat gluten for just a couple days instead of weeks.  It will make for a LONG couple days (and nights), but just may do it if dermatology thinks they could give us a definitive answer.

The rash is the give-away for Evelyn that we're looking at Celiac.  The doctor said if would have let it get a little worse we could have printed the pictures in a textbook. 

We will know by the end of this week or early next week whether dermatology will be able to help us or not. 

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