Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Written by
Dr. & Mrs. Keith Gomez
@
7:00AM
Josh has a chemical imbalance right now that the doctors are
trying to get right. They don’t know what is causing this. His left side is now
becoming less functional for some reason. The swelling has pretty much gone
down to normal. His right eye has not opened yet, but they claim this is a good
thing at this point in time. Until the optic nerve, as well as that whole
socket heals, it might be best that it stays closed.
On the day of the accident, the doctors cut his scalp from
the tip of one ear to the tip of the other ear across the top of his head.
Undoubtedly, they lowered the scalp over his face and began to repair the
cranial fractures with titanium plates and screws. As they were working on him,
they began to lose him. They then had to hasten and close him up to get him
back to ICU. They pulled his scalp back up and stapled all that together. They
also stitched all the other cuts as you have seen on the photos of Josh on the
website.
Days later, when he had enough strength, the plastic surgeon
went up under his top lip on the right side and above the gums and made an
incision. He went up into Josh’s orbital cavity and reconstructed his cheekbone
and orbital cavity with titanium plates and screws. Basically, they have reconstructed
the bones that support the face. They’ve left the smaller bones alone. His
sinus cavity under the forehead was totally demolished. It was crushed into the
brain, so they extracted it from the brain. His nasal sinuses under his eyes were crushed (pan
fractured). They left that alone, but he still has those; they are just broken
up with some older blood hanging in there…which will dissipate over time. They
closed up lacerations on his hand and right big toe, which had split to the
bone. That is healing slowly.
The good news is that they continue to lower the settings on
the respirator, which is a good sign. They are still unsure whether he will
need a trach or not. If we can get this tube out of his mouth, it would sure
lessen the chances of infection. A tube down the throat is the ultimate in
invasion of a body, and he is very susceptible to infections. All the nurses
have informed us that, unfortunately, a hospital is the worst place in the
world for a person to be when he is susceptible to infections because there are
so many germs and infectious people in the hospital.
So continue to pray for Josh. We love each and every one of
you.
Sincerely, for His Glory,
Dr. & Mrs. Keith and Carla Gomez