Living with Pediatric Urology Issues

I was about 4 months pregnant with my second daughter when I found out she had a blocked left ureter. Not knowing what to expect from the next 5 months, but it was a lot. Ultrasound after ultrasound, there was no change in her block. In a way it was a good thing, but at the same time, it wasn’t so good. I go into the hospital 7 months pregnant, April 25, 2009 just to get some testing done I wound up in the hospital unknowing to me I had pneumonia So the doctor wound up taking her out at 32 weeks. We wound up naming her Zoe, and she was a healthy preemie outside of the blocked ureter.

From the time she was born, she has been to countless appointments to have ultrasounds, blood work, urinalysis, x-rays, all kinds of testing done to keep an eye on her condition. There was always good news, and bad news, and it was all the same, there was no change in her ureter and her kidney.

This last test she had to endure was called a tracking, where the was an IV put into her hand and a catheter was placed in her bladder. The IV was placed to put some kind of medicine inside her kidney and to see how long it would take to be released through to the catheter and x-rays would be taken ALL at the same time. Looking at the screen I saw tiny white dots in a black box, that was her right kidney. But in the other black box, I couldn’t see any white dots, which was her left kidney with the problem.

We get the results to her doctor and it turns out that her right kidney was perfect. But her left kidney because of the block has little to no function at all. Surgery is still the last option. But if she were to have a procedure to correct it, it would be either putting a tube in her ureter to open the block, or go in, cut the block out, and sew it back up.

Zoe is 4 months old now and she is the happiest baby I could ask for. She doesn’t have any signs of discomfort at all and her pediatrician says she’s completely healthy, other than the ureter block.

This has been a roller coaster for her since her dad and myself found the block on the ultrasound screen when I was pregnant. But she’s in good spirit and I couldn’t ask for anything more.