Kevin back in hospital

Please pray for my friend Kevin.  

Subject: Kevin back in hospital

We'd like to start by thanking everyone for their care and concern since the beginning of this journey, about a month ago (Nov 14th).  Now we're asking for your prayers again.  He is back the hospital for another round of treatment, this time for infection.

Kevin's scar started looking irritated over the weekend, but not much.  Some dissolvable stitches were being stubborn and not dissolving, and started exposing over the last 2 or 3 days, but it started to look much better until this morning.  Kevin awoke with a swollen left side of the face and eye. His scar started exuding fluid. As fate would have it, we had a scheduled appointment with the surgeon this morning.  He sent Kevin for a MRI and it was determined that there is definitely an infection of the scalp and some of the deeper layers.  Whether the infection actually touches his skull remains to be seen; the good news is that there doesn't seem to be anything invading the brain space.  Kevin is not feeling sick, or particularly tired, nor is he in pain.  He is running a slight fever.  They have placed him on broad-spectrum antibiotics until the cultures come back with a narrower/more specific diagnosis. He is scheduled for surgery tomorrow night (Dec 15th); the plan is to open him up along his original scar, remove his skullcap along the old surgical lines, and clean everything out.  If the bone itself has not been infected, they will put him back together again with his own skull bone.  If it is infected, the plan is to close him back up without the skull piece and place a helmet on him until a "prosthetic" piece can be fashioned.  Then they will conduct a surgery to insert that, at a later date.  We are of course praying for option #1, but are fearful of keeping in the bone which may harbor more infection. 

We will keep you updated throughout.  Right now, we are experiencing quite the disappointment-- Kevin had been doing so very very well.  Even the surgeon is surprised and disappointed.  Our 2-month wedding anniversary is tomorrow.  We had been planning to celebrate it with some sort of fun activity because our 1st month anniversary was spent in the hospital. We are hoping that January 15th will be brighter.

Love and friendship,
Carolyn and Kevin

Mark 

Posted via email from Mark Kraakevik