What are we looking for in the Upper Esophageal scope? **

Post date: Oct 17, 2011 2:57:02 PM

Here is the best way that I can explain what we are looking for. If you remember, Natalie has Portal Vein Thrombosis. That's a fancy way of saying that her Portal Vein is blocked off, with a brick wall. A stupid wall.

We tried to angioplasty open this vein that runs from the spleen to the liver. And it would not budge. Stupid wall.

It's a problem that she has had off and on since August 2005. Stupid wall of blockage.

Next step would be a shunt/splint (whatever you want to call it) when an angioplasty doesn't work. But shunts don't work in people that are still growing (like a weed!). So the next option is a by-pass surgery to by-pass the blockage. But that's too frickin risky. And her surgeon wants to hold off.

So her body by-passed the blockage itself. With something called collateral vessels. Only those vessels don't like to hold a bunch of blood. Like a paper straw doing the work of a garden hose**. But we really want them to hold up. Really.

If they don't hold up, we'll see something called varices (same as varicose veins in the back of some peoples legs but occur in the esophagus). And seeing those would make her surgeon rethink his game plan.

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**I am not a medical professional. I am summarizing my child's procedure to the best of my lay-person ability. This is not medical guidance. Have a nice day :)