Viagra (For Babies?!)

Thank God for blogs. Because I recently read on another heartmom's blog (God help me, I can't remember who..), that their heart baby was put on Viagra to help them try to open up the veins in their lungs. This heartmom said that evidently Viagra was originally manufactured for cardiac patients...(possibly following open heart surgery?), and that an interesting side effect of keeping the veins open happened to be male arousal (sustained erections), because the blood in the veins in their ding dong were also kept open(?)  Seriously, I'm not making this stuff up... I swear.

Anyway, I woke up to pump and asked how Scarlett was doing. I went to bed around 9:45pm and woke up at 1:15am. Nurse Maria said that around midnight she gave Scarlett a dose of Viagra. So, like I said thank God for blogs cuz I already knew it wasn't completely *wack* of them to do that. Otherwise my reaction woulda been completely different... like WHAT THE?.....So, Maria asked if I had heard of that, and I said: "Yeah, I read it on a heartmom blog".

Maria said that all day yesterday anytime they'd decrease the sedation medication and Scarlett would wake up, her pulmonary veins (veins in the lungs) would "clamp" and her numbers would drop and her oxygen saturations would plunge, and she'd get all freaked out [yes I witnessed this several times yesterday]. Maria said its not uncommon for them to do this (put patients on Viagra). So far, she's only had one dose at midnight. She'll get another dose at 6am, then again at noon. She said it will help for when they try to extubate (take the breathing tube out) her later today.