Hi All

Luca had her six monthly scans done recently and the results were sent to Prof Mendelow, her surgeon in the UK.

Below is his responce:

"Yes I have and we were very pleased to see how much recovery there has been. The small chronic subdural should absorb with time. Many of the previous infarcts appear to have shrunk: a child's brain is amazing. As far as we can see the bypass and the synangiosis is working well. Only an invasive intra-arterial angiogram would prove patency but none of us would wish to subject her to the added risks of arterial puncture. I'm sorry for the delay but I've been to San Diego, Munster and Kaunas in the last 6 weeks and I'm off with flu right now!

So, while she is recovering and improving, we think that we should just continue with benign surveillance. If it is possible to get some sort of perfusion scan before and after Diamox (Acetazolamide) IV, that would give us a revised baseline from which to judge future developments. The perfusion scans that are available in different places are CT perfusion, MR perfusion, SPECT, PET  and Cold Xe CT. Any one of those 5 (before and after Diamox except for PET) would be perfect. I realise that it might be difficult to organise but you could ask your paediatric neurologist. Please forward this to him if you wish as I have deleted his email to me of a few weeks ago because of time and storage pressures."

I'm very happy with this news, time to crack a bottle of bubbly!

It's so difficult to fully let yourself go and celebrate stuff like this because, as we all know, it's not over. And I guess it never will be.

But hey, for today, we celebrate!!

Mark (Luca's Dad)

Hi Mark,

It's nice to hear these news!! Congratulations! You don't know how glad I am that everything is going so well with little Luca and she is recovering from her strokes ... still struggling, you're an example to us all ....

I wish you all the best. A great hug,

Paula

Mark,

this is really a great news! Happy for Luca and your family.

LuckyMe

Mark,

Today  and every day you celebrate, We had a party for Robert on his 1 year anniversay of Surgery, people were walking by saying oh is it your Birthday, our response was its his life day because after surgery life could go on, True it never ends, but we cant wrap them in cotton either.

Hooray, Mark! Hip, hip hooray for Luca! This evening, I'll raise a glass to her continued good health.
Kim

Mark,

That is so awesome. It brought tears to my eyes, gave me goose bumps and made me wish I could hug Luca myself. If I have another child I really have to steal (borrow) her name. She has stole my heart. Give her hugs....

Reagan

Great news!  thanks for posting.

Jody

Mark ~

I celebrate Luca's fine test results.

Congratulation to your entire family.

Love and hugs  to you all,

Linda
And Jack

That is Great!!! Thank you for the up date. I would definiatly celibrate this milestone.
Becky