Big Doctor's Visit

I am going to paste in the letter that I wrote to David and others as to not to have to retype it all. I will post the picture of Rebekah with her primary surgeon, Dr. Greenberg and of her new dressing. If you want to see the more graphic pictures you can go to this site: http://picasaweb.google.com/perumom/DrVisit317

The doctor's visit went fabulous. It wasn't very painful, she was more nervous than anything. I did give her 2 of her strongest pain pills for the whole adventure. We were there over 2 hours and all that time we were busy! They took off all the dressings, it isn't pretty but they are VERY pleased with how it all looks! They took out about 15-20 staples from the inner forearm area and the 2 stitches in her thumb. All the rest of the stitches will dissolve on their own, almost all of them are gone already.

Here is what I didn't understand correctly before. The large area on her forearm they removed SKIN and tissue, it looks like a dog bit out of it. All that went onto the top of her hand and middle finger. The skin graft went to cover the hole that was left in her forearm. They told her she will always have a little dip in there but over time it will fill in. It looks wicked.

She still has 6 pins sticking out of her index finger to keep the bones aligned. You would not believe how those bones have healed on xray that they took today. I was impressed! He said he still doesn't have much hope for the mobility of the finger but we will wait and see.

He told her that they discussed her case in staff meeting this morning, she is a celebrity around here. She is known as the example patient. I am SO proud of her. She is constantly telling people thank you and her bright smile wins them all over. They have never seen her out of control. God is SOOOO great and wonderful.!

We will see Dr. Greenberg again in 4 weeks to take the pins out and then he said he will decide when we can return to Peru. I told him we were due to return to Lafayette for a year come July. He about jumped out of his seat knowing that he had a whole year to make her right. He was thrilled when I asked if I could take his picture with her, he gave me his email address so that I can send him a copy!

After all that we headed upstairs to physical therapy where they cleaned it up some, wrapped it again and made her a splint and showed us exercises. They gave us the name of the therapist here in Lafayette that will work with her! Another praise, especially with the price of gas. She did well although she has already lost a lot of mobility, even in her good fingers, she needs to work at it. She will exercise all her fingers (except the index) 6 times/day, 10 repetitions each exercise. She got to giggling because she was staring at her fingers so hard trying to get them do what she wanted. Our therapist's dad just returned from a missions trip with Bethesda Baptist! She can shower with it which will help to make it look better.

We will change the dressings every day. She does have one goopy spot between the middle and ring fingers that we will watch. Have to clean around the pins every day with peroxide. The dressing is still on the thumb were the nail will be, it will grow back and that dressing is keeping the pathway for the nail to grow on. Keeping the bed of the nail present. I am constantly amazed at what they can do.