Well, Ethan is home and we're in a mad frenzy to do laundry, pack and hopefully sleep before leaving tomorrow afternoon. Ethan was SO excited to still be able to go to North Carolina. I think he misses Mike Traynor.
In the end, they believed Ethan may have had a staph infection, although only one blood culture has grown and that was one we took as a precaution last Friday. Staph (staphylococcus epidermidis) is a bacteria that lives on everyone's skin and is opportunistic in nature, so is very common in immunosuppressed patients. One possibility if it was staph is that it may have been contracted during the whole helicopter fiasco... lots of hands grabbing at that line trying to stop the bleeding. But because only one culture grew, its also possible that the culture itself (rather than Ethan) was contaminated and that Fridays culture was a false positive. Regardless, staph is very tenacious, so Ethan's been discharged with vancomycin antibiotics every 8 hours for the next week.
Thank you all for your prayers and kind words of support. This is certainly a roller coaster ride for all of us.
Warm Regards,
Kim.