Update on my mom's abdominal sonogram

At the end of my last entry I mentioned that my mom was going to have an abdominal sonogram for an abdominal aortic aneurysm that was discovered about two years or so years ago. She gets sonograms done every six months to monitor its size. If it gets close to 5.5cm-6cm, there can be cause for concern. 

The aneurysm is in the aortic vein that is in her stomach (the vein that carries the blood to the heart). An aneurysm occurs when the lining of the aorta is damaged. It can also be caused by a weakening of the aorta due to factors that run in families (eek!). The aneurysm occurs when the weakened artery stretches outward, expanding like a balloon. That bulge is the actual aneurysm. As it expands, the artery wall becomes thinner and weakens even more. As time goes on, the artery can become so thin that it ruptures (e.g., leaks, bursts, or tears open), and large amounts of blood spill into the abdominal cavity. This is fatal...death usually occurs within a few minutes. Typically the patient dies before an ambulance arrives. Usually there are no symptoms before a rupture...it just happens. Below is a picture of a normal aorta vs an aorta with an aneurysm. 

Her past several results have shown little or no growth, but the most recent one did. We found out a few weeks ago that there was no growth lengthwise, but there was growth in overall diameter. The size since the last six-month sonogram went from 4.5cm to 5cm. This is not good news, obviously. Because of this, my mom is going to have a CT scan of the area in about two weeks to see what is going on. She will also be referred to a surgeon (who she has seen previously about the aneurysm), I'm guessing after the results of the scan come back. The most common treatment is to go right in and repair the aneurysm, but with my mom being in such poor health, I don't know if that's an option. 

My other concern is the CT scan itself. She is allergic to the iodine contrast dye that is used in the CT scan...she breaks out in an itchy rash and basically looks like she has a bad sunburn. In the past the doctors have pre-treated her with steroids, but she seems to break out anyway...not as bad as she did without pre-treatment, but still bad enough to be uncomfortable and in some cases has needed treatment, once resulting in taking her to the ER where they pumped her full of benadryl and saline through an IV for about 8 hours. In addition, the contrast dye is hard on kidneys, and my mom only has one kidney...it is functioning okay, but not at 100%. The last time she had this test, her kidney function went way down and she had to have the levels monitored for a few weeks. So double whammy there...a possible problem with the aneurysm and possible compilations in the process of further testing.

Yeah, pretty scary news that has been weighing on my mind for the past few weeks...not what I was anticipating. Since the sonograms have come back consistently unchanged, I expected no different this time. Even though she has been through so much health-wise (which I've written about in many, MANY past entries), including a heart attack, this is one of the scariest to me because it's something that can happen so unexpectedly with no warning symptoms...no pain, no rash, no fever...nothing. In the past I've referred to it as a ticking time bomb, because it can go off at any time, without any warning. And now with the news of this growth, the hand could be getting closer to zero.