Yesterday we went for Mark's annual physical. We always do it in the summertime, right before school starts back in August. He saw Dr. Ercolino at Wake Forest Pediatrics, who is a pretty cool doctor to have if you are a 7-year-old boy. Everything seemed to check out ok except for his constant eczema and his asthma. He was wheezing some and his nose was pretty stuffy.Mark does basic pulmonary function tests at least once a year at the doctor's office and at UNC's children's specialty clinic, where Brett's pulmonologist follows Mark as well. You take as deep a breath as you can, then try to blow out all the candles on the comptuer screen. Mark loves doing these tests. On the 3rd try, he left all but one candle burning. The results showed that his lungs performed at 71% capacity.
Although 71% is not totally terrible, it's certainly not stellar performance. It was improved from last year's performance though. Sometimes we do the tests, then get an Albuterol treatment, then repeat the tests to see how much the treatment helped. It usually helps a good deal. Today though, it wasn't really necessary. Dr. Ercolino just asked us to use the Flovent inhaler as well as his nasal spray Veramyst twice a day every day all year long, not just in the wintertime. Since Mark is used to these medications, he is very complaint when it's time to take them. He does them when we ask, and does them correctly, and without complaint. This gives me hope that one day Brett will do the same!
As I have mentioned before, the Flovent (and Albuterol, of course) is the medication Brett takes as well. To illustrate how much more powerful a dose Brett must have, I'll tell you that Mark inhales a total of 160 micrograms of Flovent every day while Brett inhales a total of 440 micrograms. Their size/age difference goes without explaining. Also, Brett's last PFTs showed his lungs at below 40% capacity, which is why we had such a scare before he took the 12 week steroid course. I am thankful that these medications are available to help my boys *Breathe*!
What a neat way to get a kid to do a test. Hope the extra meds do the trick for Mark!
ReplyDeleteWe love Dr E! :)
ReplyDeleteThat is a great way for us to understand the comparison between the boys and their function and meds. Does the average/"normal" person perform at 100% or is that a standard hardly reached by folks (like blood ox being more like 97-99 instead of 100 even in a healthy person)?