Ariana in ER last night!

[Guest guest]

Well, the topic of chest pain yesterday was ironic, because Ariana (9

years old, 16mm ACM) ended up being taken to the ER by ambulance last

night because of it . She had been fine all day and then started

getting really irritable in the car, bickering with her siblings,

around 7:00. As I pulled into a drive-thru, she was really emotional,

yelling at me (which is not at all like her), insisting she had

already told me what she wanted when she hadn't. When I asked her

what was wrong with her, she started crying and said her chest was

" killing her " . She said it was on the *right* side and even notated

the fact that usually when it hurts it is in the middle or on the left.

So, I got our food and continued on the way. I was supposed to be

heading to a meeting about an hour away. She tried to start eating

but continued to complain of the pain. She said it was spreading all

across her chest and had started hurting a lot worse on the left. A

few minutes later, I could hear her whimpering all the way in the

back. Then she said she was dripping with sweat all over, and " even

my eyes are sweating " (the rest of us had jackets on and were fine,

even a little cool; she had taken hers off and was in a tank top).

I thought, ok, something isn't right. Her chest pain has before

always been intermittent, something she would mention and maybe lay

down for a while but never like this. So I turned the car around

immediately at that point. By the time we got back to our exit,

Ariana was saying it hurt to breathe and talk and worse any time she

tried to move. She was still sweating and kind of slumped over in the

seat. My son who was back there felt her and said she was cold and

her pulse was slow. So I pulled into a fire station and got the

paramedics to come get her out of the car.

Her blood pressure was actually high (for her); close to a normal

adult's " perfect " , but she's under 50 pounds and usually runs very

low. Her O2 sat was a bit low. She has ADHD is usually bouncing off

the walls, and she was just laying there grabbing her chest. They did

and EKG and didn't let me see it or say anything, but they called and

ambulance.

Long story short (well, it's already long), by the time the ambulance

got there, which was pretty quick, Ariana was feeling much better. By

then, she had been having the pain for about an hour. When they had

her sit up for the stretcher she got dizzy, but other than that, the

chest pain was pretty much gone. By the time we made it to the

hospital, she seemed to be fully recovered. They said she still

needed to be evaluated, but after being taken from the stretcher to a

wheelchair into the packed *waiting room* (!!!) and not even being

*triaged* after two hours, we left .

We are going in to a regular pedi doctor in an hour. She is totally

fine today, too, so I don't know what the doctor will do. When I

signed the form to leave the hospital, the nurse said " lots of kids

have chest pain episodes, and we never know why " . Um, I don't think

so, not like this. Just to make it clear, nothing like this has ever

happened before. Ariana doesn't exaggerate symptoms or do things to

get attention. I have absolutely no doubt that the pain she was

experiencing was real, and she was having external physiological signs

of it. She wasn't upset before-hand, and what we were on our way to

was something she very much wanted to attend.

I am just so worried about her. I know just because she has Chiari

doesn't mean everything is Chiari. But Chiari or not, none of her

doctors are doing anything about her. She is so underweight

(clinically " malnourished " ), and the GI people apparently are fine

with that. She is having recent swallowing problems, and they won't

call me back. She's having the numbness and more neck and shoulder

pain. And now this severe chest pain episode. And all any of them do

is nothing. Wait three months for the full-spine MRI and go from

there. She hardly eats, doesn't drink, looks like she'll break if you

touch her wrong, and I'm scared that her body is just going to shut

down (she's 9 1/2 and only weighs 5 pounds more than her 4 year old

sister).

Sorry this is so long. I guess I just needed to vent.

~Beth~