Okay, first the good news. Last week David had an appointment with his pediatrician. David was diagnosed with asthma in 2007. I take issue with the diagnosis because anyone who reads it will assume that David has problems breathing. The truth is that David has problems breathing when he's experiencing either a deep chest cold or when he's having an allergic reaction. The military medical community lumps all forms of asthma into one diagnosis and I really think that David's label should be "allergic asthma", not "asthma".
Anyways, because of his diagnosis our insurance allows him to be seen by his pediatrician every six months just for well-child check-ups. So, we went for his well-child check up. I needed some new prescriptions for him because his old ones have expired. (That's kinda cool in itself. Usually we have to get new prescriptions because we've run out of meds, but we haven't been using any of his meds, so they've expired!)
The good news is that David now weighs close to 30 pounds. This puts him in the 15th percentile by weight. The last time he was in the 10th percentile, so he's going up! Background: David was in the 50th percentile for the first six months of his life, so that's where they would like to see him. For a while David wasn't even on the chart and was considered borderline failure to thrive. We work really hard to make sure that David hits certain calorie counts every meal and every day, so this was a big reward for us.
The pediatrician had the results of some recent blood tests that were done and even though technically we were suppose to hear those results from David's allergist the pediatrician looked at them for me anyway. Every time they take David's blood they are looking at his IgE (immunoglobulin E) level. This is the Ig in charge of allergic response. They usually check his other main Igs as well (IgA, IgM, and IgG) so that they can have a clear understanding of his whole immune system. David's had some funky numbers on some of his Ig levels in the past, but it's always been attributed to his allergies and eczema. The pediatrician said that all of David's levels were now in the normal range. This was pretty exciting to me. It was a sign that David was getting healthier.
I guess the pediatrician missed a number.
The IgA and IgM came back in normal range. This is good news, especially the IgA which had been borderline low before.
I got a call from David's allergist today to go over the blood test results. David's IgE was around 500, so just about where it was last year. That in itself is disappointing. We were hoping that it would continue to go down.
But the really bad news was David's IgG level. IgG protects the body from bacterial infections. It's too low, low enough that if it stays this low the allergist said that they will need to manually replace the missing IgG. Ugg. So, in June David will have another round of blood testing (my poor baby!) to see if his IgG is still low. If it is still low he will probably have to be given manufactured IgG by IV. The thing that is most concerning to me right now is that this low IgG level has nothing to do with his allergic disease. Both the allergist and our personal medical expert, Chris' dad, agreed that it's not common for children with allergies like David to have low IgG. So, we're adding an entirely new concern to David's very full plate. I keep thinking the same thing over and over again in my head: "my poor baby".
But to temper this bad news no one is overly worried about the low IgG level right now. It's concerning and it's something that we need to be aware of, but it's not something to get worked up over. No one is worried because David is healthy and has been healthy all winter. Chris and I got the flu in November, but David didn't catch it (and he's the only one who didn't get a flu shot!). If he was immunodeficient you'd expect him to have caught it. He was in gymnastics surrounded by other children every week almost all winter and was one of the least sick kids in his class. Also, in February David and I caught a cold and were both pretty congested. In the past when David has gotten a cold we've always had to give him lung medication to keep his breathing easy, but with this cold, for the first time, he never worked to breathe. So, for the first time, right around the time this blood was taken, David was actually healthier than he's ever been in his life and needed less medication.
Just the same ... I wish his blood work reflected what we've seen situationally. I'll keep everyone posted.
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