anemia and respirator

[motownthrowdown]

Wondering if anyone has experience with anemia and blood transfusions. My daughter's doctors ordered a blood transfusion for this afternoon because she is anemic. She's been having apneas and desats pretty regularly over the past few days due to what they thought was constipation. They are checking for infection but They put her on a ventilator to try and give her a break so her body can focus on one thing at a time.

They are telling us not to freak out but it's a blood transfusion so we can't help it. She had been doing really good and was never on a respirator until today (born at 28 weeks, is now 30w4d). Anyone else have similar experience?

[sahara78]

DD was born at 29+2, and she had one transfusion. She perked up quite a bit afterward.

[direy25]

Sorry motownthrowdown, no experience - we thought DS may need a transfusion at one point but his numbers ended up coming back up. Any update on how she's doing now? Is she still on the ventilator?

[motownthrowdown]

She got a blood transfusion the night I posted originally and platelets last night. There is an infection and they are working on what kind. She's getting antibiotics and she is acting much better today. Her numbers look better as well. Waiting on the doctors to round so I can bug them about what's wrong with her.

[direy25]

DS came down with a pretty bad infection about a week into our NICU stay - the antibiotics were pretty hard on him but once he got through that things got a lot better. Hope the docs can get you some answers, the worst thing is not knowing.

[runningmommy519]

Hang in there Mo. Thinking of you and your family.

[theycallmekveld]

DS had several blood and platelet transfusions. It sounds scary but it will be okay! He also got a few infections. The older he got, the less that happened. Big hugs and hang in there, mama

[brachysira]

I was still out of it when DS was found to be anemic and got a transfusion. We didn't think much of it. He had to go back for a newborn screen in a few months because the other blood can interfere with the results.